Rain Drops
by Ink Child
Summary: A rainfall of one shots about sasu/hina. Each prompt is a single word that is the chapter title. Fourth Chapter: Loveable Chapter Five: Bubbles
1. Chapter 1

**Rain Drops**

 **Chapter One**

 **Curiousity**

 **Summary: Rain Drops is a series of one shots, that may or may not turn into a story in the end. I don't know if they will connect or not. The title is the only thing I have thought out before hand. I think about Curiosity in relation to Sasu/Hina and I write. Whatever comes out, comes out.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or anything associated.**

* * *

She felt his hands on her hips and before she could say anything in protest (although really how could she protest past the giant lump in her throat) he had thrown her, as if she weighed nothing up into the tree.

A soft gasp alone escaped her and she grabbed onto the lowest branch, dragging her body up onto the sturdy surface and feeling herself jump as he landed on the branch beside her, running up the tree trunk effortlessly, as though he had been doing it all his life.

Panic waged war against her rib cage like a bird in flight. Face reddening she struggled to her feet and pressed her back to the trunk of the tree. "U-u-uchiha-san, I-"

"Shss." The boy hissed, dark eyes flickering to her for a split second before watching again down below.

Hinata felt her breath coming in short little gasps but forced herself to slow it down, one hand over her mouth, feeling as loud as an elephant in a china shop.

"Ino, I don't think you're right I saw him go that way." Sakura's voice whined. Hinata froze for real, eyes wide, staring at Sasuke in surprise.

"I dunno, I'm pretty sure he went over-"

"You're such a baka, why did I even listen to you?"

"Don't call me a baka- it takes one to know one."

Their voices drifted closer and slowly, like a cat on the top of a fence Sasuke shifted, hands still in his pockets along the branch until he joined Hinata at the trunk, standing much closer to her than she preferred.

Lips trembling she buried her face into the tall neck of her sweater, clenching her eyes closed.

As the two girl's voices neared and grew louder, Sasuke felt his eye twitch just a moment. His dark shirt would not be visible in the dim light of the trees, but this girl's crazy white sweater sure wasn't exactly the best camaflouge.

As their joined steps lingered near the other side of the trunk Sasuke grumbled mentally, pushing Hinata into the trunk of the tree, planting his hands on either side of her face to try to block her white with as much of his blue as possible.

He watched as the Kunoichi moved below and arguing pitifully moved on, stumbling through the under bush as they shoved each other half joking half arguing about losing him in the trees.

Finally relaxing a moment Sasuke sighed and closed his eyes, turning back to Hinata and freezing.

Cheeks flaming, eyes wide with either terror or panic or both the girl stared back. Slowly he stepped away, stuffing his hands in his pockets, irritated by the expression on her face.

"Calm down." he grunted, giving a slight huff of disgust.

Hinata didn't move, just stared at him some more, eyes wide.

"H-h-hai!"

Shaking his head he moved to jump down, pausing momentarily.

"Are you able to get down on your own?"

Hinata felt her cheeks flame even hotter, only this time there was a bit of irritation to make them glow.

"Hai." she forced out, one word, no stutter. "Yes."

"Whatever." he muttered, jumping down in the most blase way she had ever seen anyone move.

Swallowing hard Hinata forced her limbs to move and jump down after him, heart hammering in her chest like a gorilla.

"A-a-a-ano."

Sasuke stopped, having started walking away in the moving filtered light of the forest ground. He didn't look over his shoulder, or give any sign that he was listening except for that he stopped walking.

Hinata bit her lip, regretting her sound immediately.

"Iie- n-n-never mind." She spun on her heel, jamming her fingers together nervously and starting a rapid fire walk down the opposite direction he was going. It was the long, long, long way home but she'd rather get a long walk in than deal with him the whole way- or worse have him think she was following...

Her face flushed again, if she got any hotter she would soon be able to function as earth's sun.

"What were you going to say?"

His voice called out after her abruptly and she jumped, having expected him to be the same distance away from her as she had moved from him.

But upon checking over her shoulder in terror she saw him walking slowly and languidly, in no hurry, after her.

After her.

"N-n-nothing!"

 _Oh my God, please go away!_ Her pace increased suddenly, and trying to not jog she stumbled through the woodland, ducking branches and prickly bushes and feeling more and more clumsy with each step. Her feet seemed to be too big and her sweater was made for catching everything one could ever NOT want tangled in one's clothes.

"Stop." he called, sounding both lazy and irritated.

Hinata froze, debating bolting. But the truth was he would probably catch her in less than a second and complying might result in a more merciful interaction.

"N-nani?" she whispered, trying not to bury her face in her hands. Hiding from him would probably look rude. _Don't be rude, don't be rude, don't be rude._

"What were you going to say?"

 _Oh no_. "N-n-nothing, Uchiha-san!" She gasped, shaking her head back and forth. "Gomen, I didn't mean t-t-to waste your time."

"Don't be an idiot." he grumbled, moving forward before she could blink. One delicate finger pressed into her forehead, and she blinked up at him, his eyes penetrating into what she was sure was the depths of her tiny young soul.

"My name is Sasuke. And I want to know what you were going to say."

Hinata stared at him, feeling acutely the touch of his finger on her forehead, against her skin, making blood flood her face like a tsunami of epic proportions.

Feeling trapped, and the only exit appearing to be answering his question she blurt, tripping over her tongue.

"M-m-m-maybe you need a-a girlfriend. So they l-l-l-eave you a-l-l-l-one."

Sasuke blinked at her for a long moment, dark eyes unimpressed. "Like I need that kind of trouble in my life." He took his hand away, stuffing it back in his pocket.

"N-n-n-not a real g-g-g-irlfriend." Hinata frowned at him momentarily, looking down at her fingers. "A f-f-fake one."

The Uchiha pondered this for a minute, contemplating.

A fake girlfriend.

 _Sorry, I have a girlfriend._

 _Get off me, I have a girlfriend._

 _Taken, I have a girlfriend._

A life free of clinging, bitching girls stretched out before him, handed to him by one little phrase. But no one would believe him if he didn't produce the girl at least sometimes... perhaps even often for a period of time at the beginning.

She would have to be of a noble clan, not irritating, therefore not part of his extensive fan club. Someone who could be quiet and who no one would suspect. Someone protected by her status from the menace of his disappointed fan girls and who he could potentially offer something in return. Training perhaps, or protection. Someone who liked someone else.

His eyes lingered on the Hyuuga before him, waiting it seemed for his dismissal.

Someone pretty, who smelled nice...

"You just got the job." He muttered, turning around.

Hinata frowned and then blanched her eyes widening as he started walking away. "N-nani? Gomen, I m-m-must have m-m-misheard-"

"No. You didn't." He called over his shoulder. "You're my girlfriend now."

Incredulous Hinata felt her hands fall to her sides, her feet moving after him a few steps and then stopping. "I-i-ie!" she gasped, terrified at defying an Uchiha. "I-I- can't!"

Sasuke turned, looking at her with the vaguest laziest curiosity ever. "Oh?" He inquired. "Why not?"

HInata gaped like a fish, a dozen reason which had been clamoring for her attention in that moment vanished, like a lightening bolt through the dark sky. "No!" she gasped, no stutter this time to her surprise, her foot stomped on the forest floor, a little less dramatically than she had hoped but it had the desired effect of making Sasuke blink at her, his blase attitude momentarily dispelled.

"No?"

"N-n-no."

He walked back to her and didn't stop, pushing her slight figure up against the tree trunk behind her, making her stutter out a series of "M-m-matte! W-w-w-wait!"

His body pressed up against hers, and with the heat of her face radiating off her she was surprised he wasn't getting a burn.

"How about you're my girlfriend-"

"F-f-f-ake girlfriend." Hinata whispered, trying to cling to the last remnants of her dignity.

"And I talk to that Dobe Naruto about how amazing you are on occasion."

Hinata's eyes widened suddenly.

"N-n-naruto-kun?"

Sasuke smirked, and his face changed. There was definitely more smirk than smile in his facial expression and yet it did change, and something in her belly relaxed, if only for a moment, allowing the glow from her face to reduce to a gentle soft pink, despite his body pinning her to the tree.

Her brain had not put much thought into it at all, which seemed to be the case whenever Naruto was ever even mentioned, and true to form words came thoughtlessly out of her mind.

"A-all right. I'll be your-"

"Girlfriend."

"F-f-fake girlfriend."

Smirking still the Uchiha pulled back, pulling her away from the tree by the hand.

"I'll walk you home."

Hinata stared at his back as they walked, him slightly ahead of her, silent and scary and now her boyfriend.

If only he had not been so curious, if only she had kept her mouth shut, if only he had not asked.

Her eyes flickered briefly to his fingers gently but firmly holding hers.

If only she had not wondered why he was running into the forest, if only she had not followed him in, lost him and had him find her.

If only she had not been so curious herself.

* * *

 ** _leave me some love, ne?_**

 ** _Inky_**


	2. Chapter 2

_**Rain Drops**_

 _ **Chapter Two**_

 _ **Abstract**_

 _ **Part One of Two...Maybe Three.**_

 _ **Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or anything associated with.**_

* * *

The Konoha School of Shinobi Arts was the most elite of the academies in the country. It fostered the growth of some of the most influential shinobi in the world. Shinobi who decided the fate of countries, who began and ended world wars.

Sasuke Uchiha had obviously been destined for such an academy. His lineage demanded it, his family history assumed it, his blood sealed it.

He was the walking epitome of excellence. Jutsu's were easily mastered, hurdles naturally jumped, his mind was quick, his wit even more so. But nothing could keep up with his fists.

One of the classes at Konoha School was obscure. It did not gain much recognition but it certainly was important. No one liked it. Like learning to do your taxes, or how to accrue credit it made people uncomfortable. A necessary dull part of life.

Especially shinobi life.

Post Traumatic Stress Therapy Class.

Among all the students in the school there was a lonely single one who seemed to really appreciate the class. She sat near the back, and listened with intent, reciting all the psychology and theories of grief in her mind. She worked tirelessly and when the final scores came in for term one only her name ranked above the famous Uchiha.

Hyuuga Hinata 99% A+

Uchiha Sasuke 95% A

Stunned Sasuke stared at the score board in the lobby, mouth uncharacteristically open. "What the hell?"

His GPA was perfect. His extra curriculars were pristine. His teams always won on debates, elections or sports competitions.

And yet here, in the middle of the bloody "Arts" category he was second?

Second?

"Holy crap." Someone whispered by his ear and he turned with a glower that would send satan scurrying to look at Kiba. "Is that Hinata's name... above yours?"

A smile began to widen on Kiba's face as Sasuke's mood darkened.

"NARUTO!"

 _Fuck._ Sasuke's eyes narrowed, fingers twitching in his pockets to unlock chidori and destroy the stupid wolf boy where he stood.

"What?!" Naruto screamed back across the large echoing lobby.

Kibra's grin just kept getting bigger, his eyes finally tearing away from Sasuke's death glare. "Guess who has a better grade than Sasuke in a class!"

"Someone has a better grade than the Teme?"

Sasuke began to walk away, determined not to be drawn into a petty useless fight. So far his record was impeccable, he had restrained himself in every situation. Four long years of high school and here he was at the end of semester one, facing the possibility of expulsion due to homicide.

No, no, he needed to breathe deep, walk away.

"HINATA IS!"

Naruto's voice followed him as he stepped out into the afternoon light, watching as the sun turned the navy sky a brilliant indigo as it began to die.

Sighing deeply he closed his eyes on the steps, pressing his fingers to the space between his brow to try to relieve the building pressure there.

As if thought alone could conjure her, one small shy Hyuuga began the slow climb up the stairs, her head down and long hair a curtain around her shoulders. Sasuke paused, watching as she hugged her books to her chest, sensing his laser like gaze on her body. Her hair glowed in the dark light of the setting sun, a thousand shades of blue and purple highlighted where it touched. It moved with the same soft fluidity of oil on water and framed her small delicate face.

She didn't look up and she didn't bother to say anything on her way past, only bowed the smallest amount possible and hurried along inside.

Brow furrowed he watched, uncaring of the redness that he was causing to spread across her neck and cheek.

How could that girl get a better grade than him?

* * *

Sitting in class, usually bored the irritable Uchiha had his eyes two rows down and one over, at the back of the head of a particular dark haired kunoichi.

In front of him their teacher drawled on and on and on, and Hinata's pencil continued to move over her paper, taking notes, stopping to tap her fingers together as she thought, pausing to nibble on her eraser once in a while, and then back to work.

 _How the actual fuck did she do this?_

"Uchiha-san?"

Like hearing through water his name resonated slow and deep.

"Uchiha-san?" more sternly. A handful of giggles made him snap out of his reverie and tear his eyes from Hinata as she turned to look along with everyone else in class.

His teacher Tsunade-sensei frowned at him from the front.

"There must be something extremely fascinating on the back of Hyuuga-san's head today, as you have been staring there this entire class, Uchiha-san. Would you care to enlighten the class on what is so extremely interesting?"

Sasuke sat still, immobile, without breath, out of the corner of his eye he saw Hinata sink lower into her seat, wishing like him, to disappear into the floor.

"Nothing, Tsunade-sensei. I was just bored." He grumbled, raising his chin in defiance.

But he was a pale person, and despite his best attempts the smallest shade of pink had risen to his cheeks at the chuckles from his classmates.

"Well, that's an excellent way to boost my ego and get yourself a better grade, Uchiha-san. So glad you find my rather important class boring."

Usually at this point in the banter between himself and teachers Sasuke could say that he had the best score in class, and likely the best score possible. But to his immediate irritation he opened his mouth and shut it, caught without words.

"Let's continue shall we?" Tsunade muttered, turning back to the chalkboard.

With only a few silly glances from his classmates here and there the class resumed. Like a magnet he felt his eyes slide, from Tsunade's back to Hinata's slouched form. She had her hand pressed up against her cheek, as if trying to shade herself from the world with her fingers, shoulders pressed tight against her ears.

He still could simply not understand how. How had she beat him in a class?

* * *

Monday mornings were never welcomed by most students, but surprisingly there were two in this particular school that did not mind them.

In her home Hinata woke on Mondays with a grin, and after cooking her lunch and packing her bags she spent some time in front of the mirror, washing her face, brushing her teeth, untangling the knots in her hip long hair with her fingers gently.

On the other side of town, near the outskirts of the village Sasuke woke ten minutes before class, throwing on the first pair of clean clothes he could find among the baskets that kept his entire wardrobe.

With a splash of cold water to the face and quick brush of his teeth he was out the door, breathing in the coolness of the late summer day.

Monday mornings meant that he didn't have to be cooped up at home, poring over books he found in the many homes of his deceased relatives.

Monday mornings meant that when he woke up he didn't have to talk himself into getting out of bed even though no one would care if he slept all day and did nothing. It meant that someone- his teachers- his classmates- someone out there expected to see him today.

At the Hyuuga estate Monday morning was filled with hopes of having a conversation with Naruto. With dreams about doing well in taijutsu class. With aspirations of making her family proud.

Everyone else felt Monday mornings could jump off a cliff and die.

As a result, in this particular day Hinata and Sasuke arrived a little early. The light of the sun had crept through their separate curtains and dragged them out of bed, before the roosters even bothered to crow.

Hinata had planned on sitting on the school steps in the brightness of the dawn with a thermos of tea and a beautifully made bacon, tomato and spinach sandwich.

Happy as she could only be when she was well and truly alone she settled with her back against one of the entrance pillars and propped open a book, munching quietly on one half of her sandwich, feeling the warmth of the sun as it poured on her face.

He came upon her that way, with her breakfast forgotten by her side and her nose buried in her book, knees drawn up to her chest as her eyes flashed back and forth on the page's face.

Blinking in the blinding light of the sun he studied her, so small and still in her nook by the doorway, oblivious it seemed to his approach.

As he stepped up to her he cocked his head, reading the title on the spine of her book.

Post Traumatic Stress Art Therapy.

That wasn't one of the recommended readings. He had already read them all. Frowning he took another step up, blocking the light of the sun on her with his broad shoulders.

Shivering suddenly, Hinata looked up, and froze, eyes wide as she gazed up at him from her rather vulnerable spot.

"U-uchiha-san."

"What is that?" he pointed at the book with his chin and misunderstanding Hinata glanced at her sandwich. "My b-b-breakfast." She paused, feeling herself start to blush slowly as he frowned at her.

"W-w-would you like some?"

Startled, Sasuke blinked, and before he could come up with a polite way to decline she had taken the untouched half of her sandwich in a napkin and extended it to him.

Exasperated Sasuke took it, partly to get her to move past this part of the conversation so he could ask about the book and partly to get the tightness in his empty stomach to stop bothering him.

"Arigato."

She seemed to be staring at him in awe, unsure of how to move forward in the conversation, tongue tied. Eventually, she looked back down, pulling her knees tighter around herself. "Y-you're w-welcome."

"What are you reading?"

Deciding he was going to get this stupid grade thing figured out now he plopped down beside her, taking a small bite of the sandwich and the staring at it in shock. That silly piece of calories and protein was absolutely delicious. Holy God.

"Art Therapy." Hinata whispered, propping it open where she was reading with her hands on the floor, so he could see a picture of a canvas on the page. "For Post Traumatic Stress caused by the work of being shinobi."

Sasuke peered at it as he took a bigger bite of the sandwich, eyes turning to slits. "What is it?"

"It's abstract art."

"It looks like a mess."

Hinata blinked at it for a long time, tracing one pale finger across the surface of the angry reds and black and purples on the page.

"I guess that's... h-h-how the artist felt inside."

He paused, eyes lifting from the picture to her face, staring intently at the artwork, her eyes soft.

"It's abstract...it's how someone sees something...it can look so different from one person to the next..."

She wasn't blushing and she wasn't looking at him, her interest held completely by the picture on the page.

 _Hm._

"Hey, teme." a voice echoed.

Hinata's eyes snapped up and then away, her face brightening to a fiery pink. Her hands scrambled all of a sudden to shut the book, to put away her unfinished breakfast, stuffing it haphazardly into her bag.

Sasuke watched with interest, munching on his share of the meal thoughtfully as Naruto's shape approached.

"H-h-have a good day, U-u-uchiha-san!" Hinata gasped, moving to stand. Sasuke blinked at her, and as the blonde came into view he muttered. "Call me Sasuke."

Hinata stared from her place up above him, her bag halfway up her shoulder.

"A-a-ano..."

"Hinata-chan?" Naruto blinked in surprise at the sight of her around the curve of the entrance pillar.

"O-o-ohaiyo, N-naruto-kun!" Hinata's voice hit a new octave, soft and feather light and scared. Sasuke picked at his sandwich absently, almost done but suddenly not hungry.

"S-s-s-sasuke-kun." she bowed at both quickly and scurried off, faster than Naruto slurped noodles.

"I didn't know you even knew her." Naruto commented, leaning against the wall facing Sasuke, watching Hinata go. "Does _anyone_ call you Sasuke-kun?"

The Uchiha wrinkled his nose with distaste for half a second. "Iie." And stood, pulling his own book bag over his shoulder.

Naruto eyed his sandwich with interest. "Hey- where'd you get that? It looks fantastic!"

"Forget it, dobe." Sasuke growled, popping the rest of it in his mouth in one bite. And with a half hearted wave over his shoulder he walked into the school, ignoring Naruto's irritated swearing behind him.

* * *

"Do you ever read anything else?"

Hinata blinked up over the edge of her book and found herself face to face with the vast void of the Uchiha stare. Swallowing the knot in her throat she lowered the book a tiny bit more. "Not...c-c-c-urrently."

"Hn." He didn't sit back in his chair, but forward, his elbows almost touching her's , one hand supporting his head. Hinata lowered her gaze fitfully, he was staring and saying nothing. She wasn't even sure it was her fault this was so awkward. Was it her natural inability to be normal around people or was he-?

"Why are you interested in the dobe anyway? Of all people?"

 _Come again?_

The hair on the back of her neck felt like it raised on end and her eyes grew so large they reflected his face brilliantly in the dim light of the library lamps.

"N-n-n-n-nani?" she whispered urgently, dropping her book and touching one hand to her cheek. It was suddenly so incredibly hot in the room, her entire face was melting. "I-I-I d-d-d-don-"

"Don't lie. It really doesn't work for you." Delicately he put one thumb on her cheek, feeling the heat radiating out of her in waves. "Lying is for heartless people."

In her head all she could hear were shrieks, little terrified, confused shrieks, not a single coherent word abounded.

"Shssss." the librarian hissed at them from her desk suddenly, and Sasuke looked around, realizing although not particularly bothered by all the wide eyed looks of the other students in the room. Whispers broke out among them and Hinata pulled away as she turned to scan her surroundings.

Turning an even deeper shade of pink she stood, gathering her books in her arms with shaking hands.

"I-I have to go."

"Good, so do I."

A word started in her throat that she trapped with great difficulty. It was No. Swallowing the mouthful she turned and scampered out of the library under the eyes of many interested people. Sasuke followed behind at his own calm unhurried swagger.

"Is the extra reading something Tsunade requested you do for extra marks?" Sasuke asked as they stepped into the hallway.

Hinata balked at the change of topic, hugging her books more closely. "I- na-nani? No."

Sasuke smirked. "You just do it for fun?"

Hinata stopped abruptly, looking anywhere but his face, feeling hot and flustered and unsure. "I-I-I do... I think...recovery after...k-k-killing someone- or-or after h-h-having a f-f-friend die in b-b-battle is i-i-important and... and w-w-what if it's not j-j-just a friend or a c-c-comrade w-w-what if- its-"

"A lover?" He peered at her face carefully, studying each feature with care.

She stopped, looking up at him, startled by the intensity of his stare.

 _What is happening? What is happening right now? I don't... I don't understand,_

Stomach flipping and flopping all over Hinata breathed out slowly. "H...hai."

"So. About the grade." He continued breaking eye contact, moving to walk around her and out the door again.

Hinata stayed still for a second, breathing in and out as slowly as she could. "I...I don't know what you mean." Her feet moved slowly towards the door he held open, waiting patiently for her to walk through.

"You don't know?" He wasn't sure if this was grating on his nerves or if he felt better that she had no idea.

"K-know what?"

As she stepped out he let the door slam and they blinked to adjust their gaze to the lack of brightness in the chilly evening starlight.

 _She really has no idea. Not a clue. While everyone else in this entire school would be gloating at having finally got a higher grade than me, she's off in the library reading extra material about the subject she already excels at, like it's no big deal._

"Nothing. I was just curious what you were getting in Tsunade-sensei's class."

Hinata shrugged, walking down the steps of the library absently. "I-I-I haven't looked. Hopefully I'm p-p-passing." she muttered with a smirk. Sasuke smirked right back. "Hn."

She stopped at the bottom of the steps, blinking at him. "S-s-so. Where are you going?"

He blinked right back for a long moment, thinking, looking at her face so intently she looked away, off down the path they were going to walk.

"I'm... walking you home."

Hinata turned to look at him abruptly again. It seemed anything amiable he did scared and surprised her, as though it was both unexpected and new to her, an unfamiliar potentially deadly thing.

"Oh!"

But she had no argument. They had just discussed, albeit briefly the infatuation with a certain blonde that she simply couldn't shake it wasn't like he could mean anything by it.

It would be nice... to have a friend... maybe?

"O-okay..." she murmured, turning to start walking, trying not to allow her feet to turn into a run. "Okay."

And off they went.

* * *

"Please make sure that you remember, the written report and the art gallery are going to end up being a combined fifty percent of your grade. Failure to do your best will result in failure of this class." Tsunade was doing a drill sergeant impression as she passed by each of her students, dropping a booklet with instructions hard on each of their desk tops. Some of the sleepy ones, like Naruto jumped in surprise.

"Fifty percent!?" Saskura screamed, trying desperately to keep herself calm.

"Also, please remember this is a team project, find a partner and start work now. Do not leave this until the night before the art gallery as it will NOT work you WIll be embarrassed, I WILL be angry. You have one month, do not wait. Get ahead now."

Beside her Naruto face planted into the desk top. "UUuUugh no... I hate these things...S-sakura, can we please, please be partners? Please please!" Naruto's whine was drowning out the rest of the class as they started to get up, looking around anxiously for a partner. Including Sakura, who as per usual, had her eyes firmly locked on Sasuke.

Also as per usual he was paying her absolutely no mind.

Head down Hinata scanned the pages of the instructions manual, wincing at the amount of work the art gallery was going to take. Unlike everyone else, this whole project had been her accidental brain child. A quick discussion with Tsunade on a book she was reading on the subjected brought up the concept of galleries and then, Tsunade's eyes had glowed like fire as an idea burst into flame within her brain. Hoping no one would ever know how she had helped turn their next month into a stressor Hinata planned to pay for her sins by helping set up the event for her and the rest of the class to showcase the art work they found or commissioned.

Muttering to herself she started highlighting certain aspects that would be important for her and no one else. Time of gallery is seven pm, she would likely need to be present at five to set out refreshments and decorate, make sure the easels were available...what would they bring for refreshments anyway? _I'm probably going to have to spend most of the day cooking..._

"Yo."

Suddenly aware that the class was quiet and that there was a shadow covering her desk Hinata froze, and slowly looked up.

Sasuke was looking down at her, face impassive and calm. He had not spoken to her since the day he had abruptly walked her home. And they had not spoken to each other then either, the silence had felt heavy and oppressive and Hinata had been mortified by the curious looks she was getting from people watching them walk by in a pair. But he had left her alone since she figured it was over. Thank God.

She had been wrong.

"When do you want to start working on this?"

Wide eyed she stared, mouth open in a round surprised fish-like O.

"I-I-I..."

"Sasuke-kuuuun"Sasuka's voice sang suddenly, and in two steps landed beside him and Hinata. The break in the quiet brought everyone else back to reality instead of staring and the class once more burst into conversation.

Eyes rolling just a bit Sasuke took a slight step back, jaw tight. "How about we partner up?" Sakura inquired brightly, her arm looping around his. She flashed him a model smile, all beautiful white teeth and glorious eyes.

Hoping this was her moment for escape Hinata began to stand, watching with a hurt although knowing expression Naruto whining from his desk at Sakura. "Aww... come on Sakura! Why him!?"

Gathering her things in her hands as the bell was about to ring, Hinata moved to detangle herself from the awkward situation, only to feel a heavy, warm hand on her bare arm. "Matte." Sasuke stated, looking a little irritated that she was going. "Wait a second."

"I-I-I actually h-h-have to-"Hinata began coloring rapidly at his touch, trying to explain that she was going to end up doing a lot more work than just the project.

"Get off, Sakura." Sasuke turned from Hinata to the pink haired nin, removing her arm as calmly as he could. "Hinata and I are top of the class. We need to be paired to maintain our grade point average."

"Oh." Sakura blinked, letting go. "Oh, I didn't know that."

Hinata's eyes didn't leave Sasuke for a moment, impressed and disgusted. What a liar.

 _At least... he let her down easy, a little..._

"Let's go." He stated, turning his dark gaze on her again, making her jump and look away. "H-h-hai- Uchiha-sa"

"Sasuke-kun, I said." he cut in, making her light up like a bulb at christmas. "Ah! H-hai! G-g-gomen!"

Sakura's face twisted into shock. "Sasuke-kun?" she whispered, following their progression around their classmates and out of the class as the bell rang. "What the...?"

"I know right!" Naruto laughed beside her, giddy that she would get to be his partner now. "I don't get it at all either. He hates it when we call him that."

Green eyes still surprised Sakura turned to Naruto's smiling face with a sigh. "Yeah... you're right. Why would he..."

Outside of the class, a few steps away from the doorway the Uchiha was confused.

"You have to what?" He looked at her quizzically. She had been trying to stutter out that she was going to be doing a lot more work than their other classmates when a bout of awful, anxiety inducing blush had crashed into her and instead she stopped, one hand up to keep him from talking, breathing in slow measured tones.

"I..." she began again. "I have to organize the gallery." Proud of herself and gaining more traction after that full sentence she glanced up at him. "I have to set up the whole thing."

Sasuke blinked at her for a moment. "Just you?" It was more of a statement of disbelief than a question but she nodded anyway. "What does that mean, exactly?"

Hinata sighed. "A-ano... renting the tables, making refreshments and bringing them, um...transporting the easels from the art class into the lobby...decorating, advertising...ano...selling tickets and keeping track of the funds raised..." she paused looking at him, for the first time ever like 'come on, get with the program'.

"Organizing." she finished, her shoulders giving one small hardly noticeable shrug.

He had not signed up for that, and yet there she was looking at him like she expected him to bolt. Maybe this was why she was getting a better grade? All the extra work had to be making Tsunade count it somehow right?

"Fine." he muttered and she sighed, relieved. Glad that he understood that their partnership was a bad idea. "I'll do it too."

Her gaze snapped back to him, big white eyes incredulous. "D-d-d-demo."

"You're welcome." he added, pushing lightly on her forehead with his finger before starting away. "See you at the library at the end of the day." He threw back over his shoulder, leaving the Hyuuga lost in a sea of her own confusion rubbing the place on her face where he had made contact with her skin.

* * *

Hours before the start of the gallery Hinata was in a fluster.

Red in the face and this time not from blushing but from working so hard she threw another cake pan into the oven at the school kitchen, her little white apron stained many different shades of food. "W-we a-are so behind!" She gasped, dragging a hand through her long ponytail.

Sasuke watched her as she looked over one more of the many recipes she was making. They had an hour to finish, and thankfully multiple ovens in the kitchen but honestly, from looking at the counter covered in different baked good and savory appetizers he blinked. "I...don't think that you need to do anymore. It's not dinner."

"D-d-d-demo." she whimpered, pressing her fingers together. "W-what if w-w-we run out?"

"People will go home earlier."

She winced, rubbing her face. They had this cake to finish and decorate, and she still had to change, thankfully Sasuke had managed to get the easels all out of the art wing and they were now strategecally placed around the school lobby.

There had been a lot to do. The weekend had been a flurry of activity. From bringing in extra tables to ordering supplies for the food and drinks, getting all the paintings delivered and taken care of, organizing all the ticket sales and funding, but the real kicker had been putting up the twinkle lights.

In her mind the twinkle lights and the chinese lanters hanging from the ceiling were the thing that would turn this from a school event to an actual gallery. They had spent the majority of Sunday climbing ladders, hanging lights, and for the chinese lanterns they had climbed onto the roof, onto the skylight, opened the window and carefully lowered the chinese lanterns down, their tummies plastered to the skylight glass, hanging two stories up and feeling less than secure.

"You could not have done this all on your own." Sasuke muttered, giving her a mild glare as he worked, wondering if the thing cracked how exactly he would save his neck. Hinata had looked anywhere but his face, finally admitting that yes... maybe it was a good thing she had a partner like everyone else.

Now her partner grabbed the stack of recipes in her hands and promptly threw them in the garbage.

"N-n-ne!"

"You don't need that, there's plenty of food, go get changed."

Hinata sucked in a breath of air. Sometimes it was nice having him around, other times...

"Fine." she sighed, turning around and heading out the door. "If the o-o-oven beeps...p-p-p-please-"

"Yes, I'll take the thing out." he sighed, putting a bag of flour back onto a high shelf. "Go."

"...Okay..." she mumbled, disappearing out the door.

Sasuke meandered through the kitchen, eyeing the timer on the stove and wondering if he would actually have to do anything. Lazily he leaned against the counter covered in food and absently picked up one of the tiny bits of savories she had on a stick on the tray. Curiously he popped the morsel in his mouth and sat up.

If only for the food he would keep her around. Carelessly he grabbed another one.

"Hey!" Hinata gasped suddenly appearing at the doorway again in a pretty lavender dress, trying to pull her hair into a bun on her head. "No!"

"You shouldn't have left then." he shrugged, giving her a smirk before tossing the stick in the garbage.

Before she could reply the timer went off and Hinata turned to check on the cake, shaking her head. "Boys..."

"Hey!" Tsuande's voice called from down the hall. "Are we ready?"

Hinata jumped, almost burning herself with her hand in the oven. "Ah!" she gasped, running to the door and peering out down the hall. "H-hai, Tsunade-sensei! We j-j-just have to bring out t-t-he food!"

"It looks beautiful Hinata!" Tsuande crooned and Hinata beamed, lifting herself up on her toes for a second. Sasuke smirked slightly as he watched her.

"A-arigato!" She turned, surprised to find him in front of her, holding two trays to take down to the lobby. Nimbly he bumped her with his shoulder on the way out. "Bet you're glad I'm here now."

Hinata blinked, watching him walk out the door bemusedly.

* * *

The village had responded surprisingly well to the gallery and in the end they had had to close down ticket sales as they could not accommodate all the interest. Hinata watched as the men and women dressed in their best wandered throughout the paintings, sipping away at punch and nibbling on her food. Rosy cheeked she grinned. they had generated talk about the Post Traumatic Stress phenomenon among their shinobi peers and raised money for the therapy. There weren't many times that Hinata could say she had felt proud but this was one of them.

Sasuke watched her out of the corner of his eyes, interested in the almost grin she had on her face. Wondering what was making her smile so much he was interrupted mid thought by a loud, "Yo!" from the gallery floor.

Hinata's calm smile faded for a moment and blushing crimson she began to organize the desserts again, moving all the pieces back into one tray and removing the empty ones.

Naruto came bounding over, his usual energy rolling of off him in waves. Behind him Kiba and Sakura followed. Sakura's pretty hair was tied up in a fancy updo, curls brushing around her face and accenting the glittering green orbs as she smiled at Sasuke.

"You did such an amazing job, Sasuke-kun." she said, hands clasped before her dress neatly. "I'm so impressed."

Sasuke sighed, moving to help Hinata gather the empty trays slowly. "Hinata did most of it." he replied calmly, making the mentioned Hyuuga glance at him in surprise.

Sakura blinked and turned to Hinata. "Did you make all the food Hinata? It's wonderful."

Hinata blushed. "Oh...A-a-rigato. Yes... we... we spent all afternoon cooking."

The pink haired kunoichi glanced at Sasuke in surprise. "Oh!" searching for something to say she continued. "Well... if shinobi life doesn't work out for you then you should open up a catering service because it's all very good."

Naruto and Kiba nodded beside her, stuffing their faces. "It's great!"

Hinata paused her work, her pale hands still for a moment. "Um..." she began, unsure of how to proceed.

"Why would shinobi life not work for Hinata?" Sasuke interrupted suddenly, looking up at Sakura with a frown. The girl blinked back at him, surprised by his tone. "Oh... no, I meant-"

"She doesn't need a back up plan, if she wants to be shinobi she will." he plopped a handful of trays into Hinata's startled hands, turning around to head towards the kitchen again.

"Are you coming? I'm not washing these all by myself." He snapped over his shoulder at the wide eyed Hyuuga.

Hinata jumped, moving to follow, her neck a bright red against the collar of her dress. Sakura watched them go, wide eyed. "I didn't...I didn't mean to say something hurtful!" she gasped, feeling Naruto's hand on the small of her back gently. "Don't worry about it..." he shook his head. "You know Sasuke..."

Following behind the aforementioned Uchiha Hinata had to half run to keep up with his rapid angry steps. Under her breath and hardly audible she whispered, "A...arigato..."

Sasuke didn't reply. There was nothing for her to thank him for.

* * *

She had long ago found the gazebo near the back of the academy grounds, surrounded by bushes, and mostly abandoned. It was white, and from what she could tell made of some type of stone though she doubted it was marble. It was old, that was for sure, as she turned in it the first time cracks of light filtered through the roof, the main shade came from the vines that had taken root in the stone and crawled into every crevice they could find, except for even they couldn't block out the excited shafts of light on a bright fall day.

Hinata had kept it to herself that the gazebo existed on the property. If she walked fast out of class with her lunch in hand she could get to the gazebo in less than five minutes, and cocooned in the vines and stone she could lay on her back on the cool stone, or on her belly swinging her legs above her with a book in her face, content to be alone for a few minutes of embarrassment free time.

The first time he had showed up she had been completely at a loss. Face buried in her book and humming quietly to herself she had looked up briefly, having felt like something moved and expecting there to be a bird she jumped.

There, on the bench in front of her sat none other than Sasuke Uchiha.

"S-s-s-s-sasuke-kun!" she gasped, scrambling to a sitting position, her face shooting to a blazing red in seconds. How long had he been there? She glanced down at her shirt which, usually hidden by a baggy sweater was entirely too revealing while laying down on the ground.

Sasuke blinked at her, looking up from his own book. "A couple minutes. You're not really here when you're reading are you?"

"N...no...demo..." she whispered, grabbing her sweater and throwing it over her head. From within it's folds she mumbled. "Y-you shouldn't sneak up on people like that!"

Sasuke scoffed. "I'm a shinobi. I don't sneak, that's just how quiet I am."

Mildly irritated that he was in her perfect little spot she poked her head out of the top of her sweater, frowning and blushing at the same time as she arranged it on her torso. "W-w-well... it's... it's not nice." she finally managed.

The Uchiha's bored gaze bore into her silently. "You want me to wear a bell or something."

An image of a cat, black as night with Sasuke same unimpressed gaze and a dangling silver bell popped into her head and she blinked. Her lips twitched for a second.

"Like a cat?" she dared.

Sasuke blinked at her mouth, watching as a smile struggled to appear on her face.

"Well it's not happening, forget it." he added quickly before she got any ideas. A quiet giggle escaped her, and feeling less animosity towards a Sasuke Neko she lay back down, comfortable in her sweater.

"Did you eat?" she asked after a few moments of quiet reading.

The Uchiha shrugged in answer, keeping his eyes fixated on his own book.

"I have food in m-m-my b-bag." she continued, turning a page. "R-right beside you."

His eyes glanced over at the bag, feeling uncomfortable. "...no...thanks..." he began.

Hinata looked up at his tone, watching him eyeing the bag like it might eat him. Puzzled she cocked her head. "It's right in there. In the bento. I made too much and couldn't f-f-finish." When he didn't move to get it she sighed. "I-I'm just gonna throw i-it away a-anyway."

Knowing what was probably in the bento and feeling the pinch of his belly from not having eaten anything at all the entire day Sasuke sighed. "Fine. But don't think I'm comfortable rummaging through your bag all the time."

Hinata stared at him, puzzlement evident on her face. "O...Okay...demo...w-why not?" She blinked. "S-s-shino-kun and K-kiba-kun steal my lunch a-a-all the time."

Sasuke stared. "They steal your lunch? Nevermind- no.. it's not the same."

The girl frowned a little, the confused expression not disappearing from her face. "Y...you're not my friend?"

Holding the bento box in his hand Sasuke stopped, staring at the beautiful laquered container in black and white, a blossoming bonsai spread across it's smooth black face.

"...I..." he began, unsure.

"I...think..." Hinata ventured, seeing as he had her bento box in his lap. "I..think you are."

Wrinkling his nose just the smallest bit he possibly could Sasuke glanced at her.

"Fine." promptly he popped open the container, and with a satisfied smile Hinata went back to reading. If he was her friend, then sharing her gazebo was okay. She could deal with that.

* * *

Naruto's eccentricity didn't seem to want to stop.

"Take that, teme!" He shouted hurling a ball at Sasuke's body. Bored Sasuke stepped aside, letting the ball pass by him without difficulty. "You're an idiot."

"Take this seriously!" Asuma was shouting from the middle of the gym. "Dodgeballs are fine to be hit by, but imagine that were kunai! Use your speed."

"Tell that to the dobe." Sasuke muttered darkly.

"What did you say, teme?!"

Beside Naruto Hinata blanched, feeling Naruto's fingers wrap around her wrist, giving her a little shake. "Can you believe this guy Hinata?! I'm gonna knock him dead!"

Before Naruto could grab another ball, Sasuke smashed one into his face, sending him sprawling to the floor.

"Shut up." he mumbled, watching intently as Hinata dropped to her knees beside the dazed blonde. "N-n-naruto-kun! A-a-are you okay?"

"He's fine Hinata, he's got a head like a cannon ball!"Sakura shouted from across the gym, flinging a ball with gusto at Ino, who shrieked back profanities.

"Demo-" Hinata continued, hesitating to touch Naruto's head for a second. "I'm okay..." Naruto grumbled, eyes closed. "Just... waiting for the stars to go away, gimme a minute."

Wincing Hinata stood. "I'll... I'll go get ice." she mumbled, turning to leave.

Sasuke's dark eyes didn't leave her once as she ran out, eventually turning away and towards the boy's change room. Whatever, he was done for the day.

"Hey!" Asuma shouted, watching him head out. "Where are you going? There's still fifteen minutes left of class!"

"Later!" Sasuke grunted, giving him a lazy wave before entering the change room and heading to the showers.

 _What an idiot._ He was not thinking about the blonde.

* * *

As they walked back towards her house Sasuke studied her face, in the light of the evening setting sun it always made her hair turn into a million different colors and in those moments the abstract art she was so obsessed with seemed to make sense.

He would buy a painting if it reminded him of what her hair looked like in the light.

"Why Naruto?"

They had been walking in silence, what she had thought was calm relaxed quiet but now she jumped, looking at him in a daze. "N-nani?"

"Why the dobe?"

"A... ..."

What had he said?

 _Lying is for heartless people._

Swallowing Hinata faced forward, anywhere was better than looking at his face as she spoke.

"...Ano... N-n-naruto-kun... is...he's..." Fantastic, special, determined, strong. So many things. Why couldn't she say them? She winced, trying to get her tongue to move.

"I think he's an idiot." Sasuke stated with vindiction, glaring at the sun as it fell ahead of them into the sea of tree tops.

"...I...I know...demo...He...he's so...he's very courageous...ano...and s-strong? And..." she paused, looking for that word that was failing her. "Inspirational." she finally murmured, then nodded with conviction, turning to him. "He... he inspires me... to...to be better?"

Sasuke stopped, making her pause a few steps ahead and turn back to look at him curiously.

"Better than what?" He blinked.

Hinata looked down, hands fidgeting with her sweater for a moment. "...well...me..." she shrugged.

His face flickered like a book through too many emotions, and glancing at him confusedly she blinked, until he settled on equally puzzled.

"You...I don't understand you." he finally stated, making Hinata both blush and fidget. "A...an...ano... sorry?"

He just shook his head in reply, starting to walk again beside her.

Better than her? He mulled that over silently, stealing glances at her as she walked beside him, holding her book bag in front of her, her cheeks blazing pink.

Why would she need to be better?

 _It's abstract...it's how someone sees something...it can look so different from one person to the next..._

He finally understood it, walking beside her watching as the light continued to dance in her hair, reflecting in her gaze. She didn't see what he saw.

* * *

 _ **Yikes that took forever.**_

 _ **This is PART ONE of TWO...maybe three. still undecided.**_

 ** _Continuation in the following update. And then back to them all being one shots._**

 ** _leave me some love, ne?_**

 ** _-Inky_**


	3. Chapter 3

_**Rain Drops**_

 _ **Part Two**_

 _ **Wonder**_

 _ **disclaimer: I do not own naruto or anything associated with it.**_

* * *

"I think it's garbage." He said it almost aggressively, like he was looking for a fight. Four months ago Hinata would have cringed and said "Whatever you say!" and hid behind her book.

But that was four months ago.

"No." she said it firmly, without the stutter. "No. It's not."

Sasuke scoffed, throwing the book at her over the table. "It is. It's self centered and forced. He was begging for pity. It's disgusting."

Hinata looked down at the painting in the middle of the table, tracing the waves of the ocean, and the tiny, white man at the centre, holding on to something, a rock perhaps, or the hull of a boat for dear life.

"He was scared... he was drowning...in his sorrow." she cocked her head at it. "This particular artist committed suicide a few months after this painting, you know."

Sasuke stopped himself from scoffing, his eyes watching her and not looking at the painting that made her so still.

"Well. At least he doesn't feel like he's drowning anymore, ne?"

Hinata's eyes snapped to his face, and stayed there. She had entered as he soon figured out, a place where nothing phased her and all the conversations they could have were not embarrassing, so long as they were honest.

"You think he is better because he is dead?"

"I think he's not feeling like... this... or whatever."

"You'd choose that road?"

Sasuke breathed in, and realized abruptly and a little late that he was getting genuinely frustrated. Usually he teased this being out, because it was interesting to see how she felt about these things that she cared about so much.

But they were going to be at a disagreement. He could feel it like he could feel thunder rolling in or a fight with Naruto brewing in his fists.

"I would, if it came to it."

"If what came to it."

"If I was drowning, although I doubt I would."

"You doubt you'd feel like you were drowning, ever. You doubt you would feel like that?" Her finger pressed down on the picture firmly, her eyes daring.

Sasuke's scoff was involuntary. "I have been through that. Yet here I am."

To his surprise instead of snapping back Hinata's head cocked to the right, her eyes softening and her mouth pouting for a moment as she pursed her lips over the words that followed.

"...do you still feel this way?"

A flush appeared so instantly on his face he sat up, away from her in the study nook of the library. In one fluid movement he stood, grabbing his bag.

"Iie. I'm not talking about this. You're not my therapist, Hyuuga." Her last name rolled off his tongue like an insult and Hinata flinched. He had not called her Hyuuga in months, it was always Hinata, sometimes Hinata-chan. Once it had been Hina-chan.

"S-s-sasuke-kun! Sasuke-kun wait!"

Abandoning her bag and jacket she ran after him, ignoring the dark look she got from the librarian as she passed the desk.

Sasuke stormed through, glaring at anyone who met his gaze, flinging the door open with enough force that it nearly knocked into her.

"Sasuke!" Finally in the hall she reached for his arm and the force with which he spun made her jump back, hands up in a show of peace.

"I'm not your patient, do you understand? I'm not going to lay on a couch and tell you my "sorrows" while you watch the clock to make sure our session doesn't go over the allotted time."

"Sasuke!" Hinata gasped, watching as the agitated young man threw his bag on the floor, stepping into her personal space suddenly, face inches from her own. "You can't fix me, okay? I'm not fixable."

Wide eyed she gasped, her hand twitching for a moment, wanting it seemed to her, to touch his face.

"I... didn't think you needed... fixing..."

Startled by the lack of anger in her response Sasuke stepped back, breathing hard, blinking at her like she had suddenly broken out in a different language.

"I'm... we're... we're friends right?" she cocked her head, feeling tears welling up in her eyes. _Don't you dare cry right now Hinata Hyuuga. Don't you dare._

Smiling to hide the tears welling there she shook her head. "I asked because... you're my friend... it's my job... to ask."

Trembling Sasuke turned, picking up his bag with shaky, unsure hands.

"I have to go."

"H-hai... okay."

He strode away without looking at her, stopping at the door. "G...gomen, Hina-chan."

Behind him Hinata smiled, this time unable to keep some tears from slipping down her cheeks, thank goodness he wasn't looking.

"D-don't worry, Sasuke-kun. Don't worry."

* * *

"I don't want to go." He muttered, throwing the shuriken with unusual force into the training stump at the target practice field on the school grounds.

Hinata, who trusted his abilities completely was sitting cross legged on the stump above the marker. She huffed her cheeks out slightly and sighed.

"Don't make me go alone...o-o-onegai, Sasuke-kun."

"The dobe is going to be there. I'm not going."

"N-n-naruto-kun is not a d-d-dobe." She frowned. Many of his flaws had melted away over the course of the year, his gruff replies, his wicked glare, his lazy uncaring attitude. But this thing, with the _dobe_ just wouldn't let up.

"Whatever."

"O-o-onegai, Sasuke."

No kun, san, sama- nothing. Just Sasuke. Something about when she used his name like that always made him give in. Feeling the frustration and the desire to please fight inside his chest for a moment he sighed.

"Damnit." he grumbled, flinging the kunai at the target.

Hinata looked down at the center where all his knives were fighting for space grinning, knowing she had won.

"I'm not changing, just so you know." He grumbled. Hinata blinked, jumping down from the post, hands fidgeting in front of her. "Do most people?"

"It's a party... they do that kind of thing. Dress up, cologne. Whatever." he shrugged his shoulders indifferently as he pulled the kunai from the stump.

Hinata looked down at herself, wincing. "I... I may need to change then."

"Don't."

"But I'm dirty..."

"Hina."

"Sasu."

"Don't call me that." he muttered, flustered all of a sudden. His stomach dropped into his toes and he shivered. Hinata laughed. "I h-h-have to. Your reaction is so f-f-fun."

"Fine, fine, go get changed then. I'll meet you there."

"Hai!"

And off she went, practically skipping with joy. That's how one wrangled an Uchiha into going to a party.

* * *

It had been a horrible mistake. A horrible horrible mistake.

Hinata sat on the barstool in Sasuke's kitchen under the one dim light that he had bothered to turn on as they stumbled into his house.

Frantically she had ripped apart his fridge, looking for anything even remotely frozen to put on his eye, and on his fists.

Thankfully there was plentiful ice, and after wrapping it in a tea towel she climbed onto the stool beside him, pressing the cool pack against his face, wincing for him as he grimaced.

"Aw, fuck." He grumbled.

"W-w-why did you have to do that? I mean, seriously?" rarely did she sound incredulous, but if ever there was a moment where that was necessary this was it.

The party had been going fine, albeit a little uncomfortable. Everyone was dressed so differently. The girls she knew from class were in their best, sparkly jewelry and bright lipstick, their bodies moving to the rhythm of the music blasting from the speakers that Shikamaru had put all over the house.

It was chaos, so many bodies packed into one place made it insufferably hot. Liquids were being consumed in high volumes from plastic cups passed around and abandoned when empty all over the place. Sasuke stood near the back, watching everything and nothing, surprising those who made eye contact.

"Is that Sasuke Uchiha?" He saw them ask each other.

Naruto had been equally surprised but mostly just glad. "About time you tried to be less of a hermit you weirdo. Come on, dance with me and some of my friends."

Sasuke scoffed, shaking his head. "No thanks, I'm fine here."

Naruto shrugged, glancing over at the dance floor where Sakura and Ino and several other girls of their class were bouncing. "Well, the view isn't bad either! Enjoy!"

Disgusted Sasuke shook his head, turning away to glare at the wall. His head was already starting to pound and he hadn't even drank anything yet.

Finally to his immense relief he felt a tug on his shirt and turned to find Hinata looking around in complete awe.

"This is frightening!" she yelled over the sound of the music.

 _Thank God, can we go now please._ Sasuke nodded, and then stopped.

She wasn't wearing her regular clothes, she was in jeans unlike the rest of the girls who were in some sort of paint in the shape of a dress. But the pants were flattering and the top she had on was white and flowing, cut to hang from her body feather light and from her collar bone. Her hair was down, brushed into a silky smooth waterfall of ink.

He realized he was staring when he noticed her earnings glittering among the darkness of her hair.

"Oh- t-these...were my moms." Hinata murmured more quietly, leaning into him so she wouldn't have to yell in the boombox they had walked into.

He could smell her soap and shampoo, and before he knew what he was doing had placed his hand on the small of her back.

"Can we go?" It pained him to ask but he couldn't even hear her here, and with her eyes glittering like the diamonds in her ears he couldn't stand not being able to ask why she looked so filled with starlight.

Hinata studied his face, pondering for a moment but before she could answer Kiba's shocked face appeared between them.

"Hinata?"

The girl jumped, bumping her hip against Sasuke's in her surprise, feeling sandwiched between the two tall trunks of the boys.

"Ah! K-Kiba-kun, h-h-h-hi!"

"Hey, I wasn't sure you would come! I told Sakura you would! She didn't believe me!" his shoulder moved slightly and suddenly Sasuke was more behind him than beside him, the triangle of their bodies moving to exclude him. A growl rose in Uchiha's throat.

"O-oh!" Hinata smiled shyly. "Ah, well...I-I w-w-was going actually..." she began her eyes flickering to Sasuke quickly.

Kiba glanced back at him. "Oh you brought him? How did you manage that, he never comes. Come on, do you wanna dance?"

"A-a-ano!" Hinata began, feeling her hand suddenly grasped by Kiba's firm grip turning towards the dance floor.

It happened so fast she couldn't be sure who started it, but she had a very very good idea.

Kiba hit the floor hard, almost dragging her with him except that Sasuke had a grip on her arm and straightened her out before she fell, pulling her behind him slightly, ready for the impact of Kiba throwing himself helter skelter into his gut.

The two boys crashed, breaking a table in the hall behind them. Hinata gasped, pressing herself to the wall to avoid a potentially fatal blow as their fists flew.

"Sasuke! Sasuke stop!"

The party suddenly exploded, people trying to tear them apart and the sound of the music and screaming was causing so much chaos it was hard to say which way was up, but in the fray Hinata grabbed a hold of Sasuke's waist pulling with all her might, using a doorway to drag him backwards.

It seemed to be working, to her utter shock and she realized that Naruto had jumped in to help, pinning the jittery form of the Uchiha to one of the hall walls while Shikamaru and Shino dragged Kiba's shouting form away to the kitchen.

"Damnit, teme! It's the first time you're here and you're already breaking crap!" Naruto grunted, letting go of Sasuke before he started hitting him. "Calm the fuck down."

Sasuke's breath was ragged. It had not been a good fight. He had shoved the guy from behind for crying out loud. If he had been in Kiba's shoes he probably would have reacted the same way... but he also wouldn't have been such a jerk in the first place, talking about him like he wasn't there.

Hinata's hands were suddenly on his wrist, looking at the painful red knuckles of his right hand. "Oh, God... I can't imagine how Kiba's face looks." she whispered.

Something about her comment made him laugh, in the strange stupidly loud room he let out a dark chuckle, shaking his head at her. Hinata stared back. The most he had ever showed her before had been a wide sparkling smirk. Never a full on laugh.

"What the fuck has he been drinking." Naruto shook his head, looking at Hinata questioningly. "What'd you give him?"

"N-n-nothing, N-naruto-kun, I swear!" Hinata gasped, turning a bright angry red. Her face and the way her eyes lingered on Naruto's sobered him up plenty fast.

Abruptly he turned, heading back down the hall towards the door.

"S-s-sasuke-matte!"

"Iie, you should stay."

"D-d-demo!"

"Stay!" Sasuke snapped suddenly, turning around with a glare. Hinata jumped, feeling the hair on the back of her neck bristle on end. But she wasn't scared, she frowned, opening her mouth to retort but finding herself interrupted suddenly by Naruto's hand shoving Sasuke back roughly.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Naruto grunted.

Hinata's eyes widened. "No! No, Naruto-kun! It's fine!"

"The hell it's fine, you're the only person I see here who gives a damn and he's yelling at you like you're some sort of dog."

Hinata flinched. "T-t-that's not-"

Sasuke shoved Naruto back sharply. "What did you just say? She wanted to come, she should stay, I'm not treating her like anything-"

"You're a dick you know that?" the blonde didn't back off, pushing back into Sasuke's space without fear. "She's not like the others, you can't just treat her like your disposable fan club garbage, that's not fair."

Hinata buried her face in her hands. "H-he doesn't!"

"You're one to talk, treating her like she's some random thing to protect when you feel like it- have you ever even looked at her closely, Dobe?"

Naruto scoffed. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Sasuke no!" Hinata shouted, face starting to spark fire.

"You should look at her when she's trying to talk to you, really look at her, tell me if you notice anything you have been missing. For years, you big idiot-'

Naruto punched him then, hard and Sasuke let it happen. It was fast, and he probably would have clipped him in the jaw or something if he had been trying to get out of the way but honestly he was just so tired. The knock to the head sent him flying to the wall behind him and in the space Hinata jumped, hands up against Naruto, face white as paper.

"No! No stop it!"

Naruto started, glancing back at Sasuke for a second as he slowly dragged himself to his feet. "Get out of the way, Hinata-chan."

Finally fed up Hinata shoved him, it hardly moved him at all but the push and contact made him stop, watching her eyes fill with tears. "Screw you! I said stop! I said no!"

Blushing because she was blubbering in front of everyone she turned, grabbing Sasuke's arm in death grip. "Come on."

"You're seriously leaving with him?" Naruto shouted as they opened the door to leave, people were watching and she was sure they were doing more than whispering to each other but with the music still playing there was no way she was gonna know what they said and she thanked her lucky stars for that.

"Who the hell else am I going to leave with, dobe?" Hinata whispered to herself with clenched teeth. Sasuke's eyes widened, looking at her in surprise as they walked out the door into the quiet where he could hear her muttered breath clearly.

"Oh, s-s-stop that." she continued at the look he gave her. "Please let's just get you home."

And now, there they were, sitting in the kitchen, icing the two nasty sore bits of Sasuke Uchiha.

"S-stupid. There's no other word. It was s-s-s-stupid." She continued under her breath, leaning over him a bit to get a look at his cheek and eye turning a series of green, yellows and purples.

He started suddenly, reaching out to touch her ear and making her freeze. The contact was so different from anything they had ever exchanged. Usually, it was a pat on the back, a book being slapped on their arm, the brush of their jackets as they squeezed through the door together.

Sasuke's eyes flickered to Hinata's surprised gaze and back to her ear where his fingers, warm and gently rubbed her earlobe.

"Your...earrings." he whispered, feeling suddenly hoarse. "One is missing."

Hinata reached up abruptly to touch her own ear and felt her hand tangled among his fingers, freezing again. Her small hand in his she was surprised to feel a lack of blush rising to her cheeks. No one held her hand. No one had ever tried, she had thought it would make her melt to putty on the spot but it didn't, it made her hand feel like it was on fire, sure... but not quite like she had envisioned.

She had seen it in her mind as concrete, as a defineable feeling, one you could articulate and talk through, but it was abstract, it moved in odd shapes and sizes, different colors. It had been Naruto in her mind.

This had not been an option.

Abruptly, realizing what was happening her cheeks began to grow warm, her gaze changing from confused, to startled and finally, panicked.

"I... I should go! It's late! M-m-my father will be so angry i-i-if I'm..."

"Don't lie Hinata." Sasuke murmured, looking down at the counter top, shaking his head slowly. "It really doesn't work for you."

Hinata stopped at the door, her hand on the handle, knuckles white.

"Lying is for heartless people." she murmured, remembering, studying the ground.

Sasuke blinked, looking up in time to see her step out of the house, closing the door quietly behind her.

* * *

 _You can't be here... you can't be here right now, go home._

Hinata paced, in front of his house, back and forth like a caged beast in a circus show.

No no no no. She had to go home, she had to go home.

In front of her the apartment lights were off, and the road was empty. Had she not been a shinobi she might have been a little scared in the darkness of the street, but she couldn't be afraid of that right now she was more terrified by the fact that she was standing there, in front of his house, hyperventilating, and had been doing so for several hours.

"I can'.t I can't. I can't. I can't."

But there she was, still standing there, feeling sick.

It was well past midnight. The time to return home and NOT get in trouble was gone, it had fled with the rise of the moon and now she was either going to get chewed out without accomplishing anything for it or chewed out with some answers.

Taking a deep to the belly breath she straightened her hair one more time, and then walked rapidly up to the door of the apartment building and stepped inside.

The motion detector light turned on in the lobby and as she blinked in the sudden brightness as she glanced at her watch.

Oh God, it was two in the morning... could she really do this? Oh God...

Her hand shook above the buzzer button with his name.

Come on, Hinata. Come on.

Before she could chicken out, she pressed it, hearing the loud bell like scream of alarm and wincing, regretting her decision right away.

I could run, I could take off he would never know I was-

"What the hell?" Naruto's voice echoed from the intercom. "What the actual hell?"

"A-a-ano!" Hinata gasped, burying her face in her hands. This had been the worst of idea in the long sad history of worst ideas, clearly. "Gomen! I -i-I"

"Hinata-chan?" Naruto sounded completely confused and groggy. "What the hell is everything okay?"

Hinata breathed out rapidly. "H-h-hai, I just... I just..."

"Hold on, hold on, I'll buzz you in." Naruto interuptted. Hinata listened to the buzz with a wince but started up the stairs slowly, one step at a time, like marching to her death.

 _Oh my god, what was I thinking? What am I going to say when I get up there? I mean honestly what can I possibly make up now?_

On the second floor Naruto stood at the end of the hall. He was in a pair of sweats, and nothing else. Hinata stopped a few doors before his doorway, feeling more and more like walking into that apartment just could not happen. Blushing furiously she looked down at her hands.

"I-I'm so sorry, Naruto-kun... I just... I haven't been able to sleep and I... I needed-"

Naruto peered sleepily at her, leaning one shoulder on the door frame. Blue eyes puzzled he cocked his head. "Hinata. It's two in the morning... is something the matter?"

"Yes."

He blinked, and Hinata took one unsteady step closer, trying really hard to not be aware of his bare chest or his cute ruffled expression.

"Sasuke...Sasuke said some... things... at the party..."

The blonde started. "OH. Oh that..." to her surprise upon peeking she could see a pink tinge covering his cheeks and her eyes widened. No...

"I just... I didn't want to just leave it... at that...and I couldn't... I couldn't sleep and I..."

"Do... do you want to come in Hinata?" Naruto pushed the door open behind him.

Her whole body tingling Hinata looked up at him finally, trying to keep her eyes on his face. Her clothes were ruffled, she looked tired, she was sure. Her hair was tangled from running her hands through it nervously for several hours and now he was there, bare from the hips up and looking gently but also pointedly at her. Her stomach did an awful painful flip.

"Iie... I really... I really can't."

Naruto bit his lip, searching her face intently. She had moved a tiny bit closer and it felt less like they were having a conversation across an endless chasm and more like she was there to actually talk to him. But she stayed, he noted well out of his reach.

"You don't have to worry about what Sasuke said." He finally put out there gently, trying to make eye contact with again. "I'm sure he was just..."

"I have liked you for a very long time." Hinata blurt and Naruto stopped, suddenly very aware of the fact he was shirtless, and that she was there in the middle of the night.

Her heart was hammeing so hard in her chest that she thought he could most likely hear it. Certainly he could see the flashes of blood coursing through her face.

"Oh... oh, Hinata... wait..."Naruto began, reaching up to rub the back of his head.

"No- no... I'm not here to...I did, like you, for a long time..." Hinata started at his awkward tone, moving forward rapidly. "D-d-demo...demo I've always been pretty sure that ...that you and Sakura-chan..."

"Yes." Naruto nodded slowly, and then, added more quickly. "Hinata, you're a beautiful girl... and you're so sweet, don't get me wrong at all... I just... uh... Sakura and I..."

"No, I know..." Hinata waved her hands in front of her face, feeling so incredibly uncomfortable. "I think I just... I think I just needed to hear you say...that..."

"Naruto?" A girl's voice from behind him called suddenly and Hinata's eyes widened, her eyes flashing to the blonde's in surprise.

Naruto paused, looking back and forth between the girl at his door and the girl who was coming out of his bedroom towards the entryway.

"I need to go!" Hinata gasped, turning right around on her heel and heading down the hall at a fast enough walk that her hair moved behind her like a cloak.

"One sec, Sakura." Naruto called, closing the door to his apartment and jogging quickly down the hall after Hinata.

"Hold on, Hinata, hold on." He gasped, catching up to her rapidly and turning her around.

"Listen... I... I am an idiot and maybe... maybe if I had noticed, if I had been paying more attention maybe..." he stopped, his eyes searching her blushing face. "Please don't be sad... You're my friend, I never would have wanted to hurt you. I promise."

Hinata started, turning to look at him in surprise, realizing all of a sudden.

"A...ano... I'm actually... I think I'm okay."

He blinked, his hands on her shoulders squeezing as he smiled. "Oh good."

"Naruto?" Sakura's voice called from down the hall, and as the door opened her pink head peeked at them from around the frame. "OH! Hinata-chan... ah... hi..." she began awkwardly and then promptly hid back inside.

Hinata smirked, and for a moment Naruto thought he saw Sasuke on her face. "You should probably go." she commented.

"Oh yeah." he nodded with a laugh, and abruptly hugged her tight. "See you later, Hina-chan."

Hinata blinked, having never had him call her that before.

"I heard the teme calling you that once and I was like, well fuck if he gets to why don't I, ya know?" Naruto laughed over his shoulder, giving her a quick wave.

"See you at school on monday."

Hinata waved back and when he was inside started walking slowly back down the hall, pressing her fingers together thoughtfully.

In the silence she studied the feeling in her chest, it wasn't the heartbreak she would have expected. She always assumed that there would have been a crack in her entire reality if she witnessed what she had just seen. She figured, the tears would have been overwhelming, the air wouldn't have been enough to fill her lungs, but as she walked back down the stairs she paused at a landing, in the dim light of the stairway lantern.

She felt...weightless, like a feather. None of the heavy painful drag of sadness on her limbs.

Back on the dark street she sighed, and after a moment allowed herself a funny little twirl in the dark before starting the calm cool walk back home.

Suddenly remembering that Neji-nii was probably going to bite her head off she blanched and took off running down the street.

* * *

He woke up with the worst headache he had had in a very long time and had a suspicion that it was due to a concussion because, as far as he could remember he had not had any liquor at all the night before.

But then, if he had a concussion, likely he wouldn't remember the drinking anyway so who knew?

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck." he gasped, burying his very sore and swollen face under his pillow. The concussion had not been able to wipe the moment in the darkness of his kitchen when Hinata's eyes had filled with shock and panic at his touch on her ear, and how she had scrambled off the stool and out the door in a hurry.

What had he even said? Had he called her a liar?

"Aw... fuuuuuck."

The light from outside was trying and failing to get into his room. Little fingers of it had crawled in at the corners of his curtains and around the highest point in his ceiling. It was past early morning which is when he usually got up, and he just didn't give at all. Burying himself more deeply into his bed he closed his eyes and winced, trying to keep the most agonizing moment of the night from replaying over and over in his mind.

No, no, no, no. What an idiot.

A small hardly audible knock on the door made him freeze.

What the.

Knock, knock, knock.

It was the politest knock he had ever heard, he even wondered briefly if maybe it was just the sound of someone knocking next door, but after a second of listening and thinking the person had gone away he heard.

"S...sasuke-kun?"

He was up. He was up and he was scrambling like bat out of hell, grabbing a clean shirt, throwing it over his shoulders and cursing as it scratched his swollen face. Hopping on one foot he stumbled down the hall, struggling to get his pants up over his legs and buttoned, pushing his mess of hair back away from his face before flinging open the front door.

Hinata stared at him, sizing him up.

"What?" He grunted, irritated that heat was rising to the back of his neck.

"Somehow I always thought... you were a morning person." she commented briefly, then reached out, making him jump as she tugged on the tag sticking straight out of his shirt at his side. Her fingers brushed for the briefest of seconds the skin of his hip above his pants and he swallowed, unaware that was such a sensitive spot.

"It's inside out." she laughed.

"Shit."

"Are you going to let me in or what?" she asked, surprising him again as she lifted the basket in her arms up. "I brought...well it was supposed to be lunch, but I think it's likely your breakfast right?"

Without letting him process she moved inside, putting the heavy woven item down on the counter where he had left the pack of ice to melt after angrily heading to bed the night before.

"Good thing I wrapped it in a towel." she mumbled, picking up the soggy mess and heading to the sink with it.

Sasuke stared some more, still standing by the open door in confusion. For a moment he contemplated saying something, about what had happened... or not happened, last night but she was pulling stuff out of the basket and talking and he realized asking him questions.

"Sasuke? Are you okay?"

"Oh... Hai. Yes. I'm fine." he paused. "What was the question?"

"I was wondering if you're allergic to mushrooms." she lifted up a little bowl of tiny pearl sized mushrooms. "I am making a stir fry."

"No..." he shook his head and stopped immidiately, regretting the movement. "Bugger." he winced, touching his face.

"You should have taken some pain killers and kept icing it for a bit." she sighed, walking back around the island to look at his face more closely. Feeling the closeness of her body with extreme awareness Sasuke leaned back, using he wall to brace himself. "I was tired."

"Don't complain, I got to sleep at four in the morning after Neji-nii tore a strip off of me."

"Neji?" Sasuke blinked, trying not to pull away as she touched part of his face that looked like it might be bleeding again. Her fingers came away red and she frowned. "You need a bandage on that, maybe even stitches. We should go to Tsunade-sensei."

"Neji chewed you out? For four hours?"

"No." Hinata laughed, walking back to the kitchen and digging around in his freezer again for more ice. "No, I got home nearly at 2:30 and after getting chewed out by my father for half an hour Neji demanded I tell him where I had been which took about another hour and then four oclock came and unlike some people," she glanced at him over her shoulder. "I was up at a regular time."

"What time is it, actually?" Sasuke muttered, trying to find something to look at other than her. She was... different somehow but he couldn't exactly tell how. The stutter had minimized, for one thing but maybe she just felt more relaxed with him incapacitated by the stupid concusion to his brain.

"Almost one." she answered briefly, walking back towards him with another towel full of ice. "Here." she murmured, pressing it very gently into his face.

Sasuke stared at her, standing he was a head taller, her face hovered near him, and after a second she glanced over at his eyes and back to the bruise, face darkening with a blush briefly.

"So?" she asked brightly, letting him continue to hold the ice. "Are you allergic to mushrooms or not?"

He shook his head, slowly this time. "No."

"Good. I make a pretty mean stirfry but without mushrooms it's toast." she smiled, and walked back to the kitchen.

Finally Sasuke closed the door, still watching her back as she chattered on and started chopping things, waving the knife around to accentuate points.

He listened, or tried to, while also trying to figure out what exactly was happening, although no amount of thinking seemed to be giving him any sort of answer.

* * *

"Sasu!"

"Don't!" He called back through the door, taking deep slow breaths to steady himself. _Don't call me that, I can't think when you call me that._

"Saaaasu..." Hinata sang.

 _Damnit._

"Hinata. I swear."

From the other side of the door he could hear her laughter, a sprinkling of wind chime bells in the breeze.

"We're going to be late." she said more seriously and he nodded even though she couldn't see him. "I know. I know."

Throwing his books into his bag and his arms into his jacket he stepped out into the brightness of the snow covered world. Everything glistened and sparkled, and standing at the bottom of his stairs was Hinata with the cutest purple earmuffs on her head, grinning.

Before he could even say good morning a snowball hit him in the face.

Squeaking out half an apology and half a laugh, she ran, or tried to on the slippery snow, arms windmilling to keep her balance. "Don't kill me!"

Sasuke followed after her more slowly and deliberately and therefore more steadily, avoiding the slip and slide of the pavement.

"You didn't even wait until I turned around!" He called, bending down to grab a handful of snow.

"I couldn't hit you if your eyes were on me- I mean come on!" Hinata yelled over her shoulder, finally sliding onto the puffs of white snow that were piled around the frozen sidewalk. Crunching it quickly she started to run.

"You shouldn't pick fights if you can't finish them."

"Oh says you." she grunted, stepping over the snow dunes in a hurry and feeling despite trying her best to run that somehow at his steady walk he was still catching up to her.

Finally he took aim and fired, making an explosion of white explode on her back.

"HEY!"

He scooped up another handful while she scrambled to get the snow out from her hood.

"No, no, no, I surrender!"

"Like that's gonna work." he smirked, chucking another snowball into her stomach.

"HEY! The rules of war demand that when an opponent surrenders you STOP!" she gasped, ducking as another snowball flew over her head.

"Rules were made to be broken."

"You were complaining about me hitting your back! Now rules were made to be- ack!" Hinata gasped as a snowball finally hit her head, dusting her completely in white snow.

Laughing hysterically she sat down and then plopped onto her back in the cushiony frozen water. They had barely made it two houses down from his doorway. They were going to be more than just late.

Sasuke came to stand over her, blocking the sun from her face so she wouldn't have to squint at him.

"Do you surrender?"

"I did like... five minutes ago-not that you cared." she replied primly, moving her limbs to make a snow angel.

Sasuke smirked, watching her moving. The snow contrasting with her hair and matching her eyes. She smiled back at him for a moment, cheeks pink, whether from the cold or something else he wasn't sure.

"I don't want to go to school." she finally whispered.

Sasuke stared, thinking for a moment. He had a perfect attendance record. He had never missed a day not even when he had strep throat the year before, he had sat at the very back with painkillers in his hand and enjoyed the excuse to not talk or be touched by anyone.

"Won't your father..." he began, and she grinned, making him stop talking with the brilliance of her smile.

"You'll skip with me right?"

Sasuke thought, calculating the cost.

"I'll make hot chocolate, and we can watch a movie in your room." she continued, making an image of her, in his bed flash in his mind for a second.

His cheeks felt hot, and for a second she had the same curious question about whether or not it was the cold making him red.

"Okay." he nodded.

"Yay!" She reached a hand up and slowly he pulled her to her feet, always so surprised by how tiny she was.

"See? Sometimes opposing sides can come to an agreement!" she concluded, moving to walk back to his house slowly, holding on to his arm because the ice was threatening to dump her on her butt.

"I don't think anyone can agree that hitting a person on the back is fair game." he retorted thinly.

Hinata laughed, skipping up the stairs to his house and walking in like it was hers. "Ne... all is fair... in love or war."

She paused, glancing back at him for a moment before removing her jacket.

He bit his lip. He had no argument for that one.

* * *

She had fallen asleep. In the heat of the bed, with her belly full of hot chocolate, marshmallows and the most amazing mac and cheese he had ever had she had passed out, her cheek pressed into his shoulder, hands relaxed on top of the blanket.

The movie was still playing but he didn't think it would for much longer. It was some old thing he had never heard of before but she said she loved, and even though he had been trying to pay attention instead he had been dimly aware of the fact that she was in his bed. Fully clothed sure, but still in his bed, among his blankets and on his pillows. Now, not just fully awake but fast asleep.

Not that it mattered they had nowhere to be (except school of course) and it was hardly midday. Eyeing her absently he breathed in and shifted himself down further into the blankets. The movement made her shift and quietly she turned onto her side, curling her body around him slightly, one hand resting on his shoulder near her face, her bangs hiding her cheek.

Their friendship had taken a funny turn he didn't really know how to interpret. Before they had been buddies. He didn't carry her books, or walk her from class to class or anything. They moved around each other like matching magnets, similar but always a little bit away from each other.

Lately though, since that party actually, she had become... different.

She had never been, unfriendly but now she was over on the weekends, cooking and watching movies and doing homework.

She would touch his face to examine the slowly fading bruise on his cheek and her hands lingered on him when she needed something to hold on to to put her shoes on, to climb up onto the counter to reach a high shelf, to move him out of the way so she could reach a book he was blocking at the library.

And now this, he stared at her, her breath coming in and out slowly, her pink lips full and shiny. Was she wearing lip gloss? Is that what they called it? Lip gloss?

At least she wasn't stuttering anymore, her sentences sometimes slow to come out when frustrated or embarrassed but most of the time she just laughed, and talked like they had been doing so all along.

Startled he looked up at the TV hearing the sound of the end credits beginning to roll. Beside him Hinata shifted, burying her face further against his shoulder.

"I'm not moving, just so you know." her muffled voice said.

Sasuke started, surprised. "I...I didn't think you were awake."

"I'm n-not."

"...right."

One pale eye emerged from the depths of the blankets and his shirt sleeve to peer at him. "Did you like t-the movie?"

Sasuke tried to think back on what it was about. "Hai." he lied, completely unsure.

Hinata smirked, and buried her face back underneath his arm and blanket. "You shouldn't lie, you know... it doesn't suit you."

"Hn." He muttered carelessly, leaning back against the pillows again.

"L-lying is for heartless people." the muffled words were hardly loud enough to hear but it made him pause, looking down at her in confusion and wonder. But she didn't come back out, and after a few minutes her breaths were slow and even signalling deep sleep.

He thought that there would be no way he could ever sleep now, with her there, and with what she had just said, but somehow in the stillness after a few minutes he felt himself fade and didn't even try to make it stop.

* * *

"Naruto-kun said-"

"Ugh, no one cares what that dobe says." Sasuke grumbled, in a particularly foul mood as he looked down at four books open on the table.

Hinata frowned at him a moment, then decided to continue, ignoring his outburst.

"Naruto-kun said that everyone was going to the hills for some sledding tonight. They are having a fire, and roasting marshmallows and I think we should go."

Sasuke glanced up at her for half a second, trying not to look too death inducing. "No."

"Why not?"

"I'm not going, Hinata."

"D-d-demo." she began, flustered.

"You go."

She stopped, taking a deep breath to calm herself. "I will then."

Surprised he looked up, also surprised again by the frown that was clearly marked on her face as she glared back at him. "Fine." he snapped, slamming his book closed.

"Fine." she retorted, crossing her arms over her chest and getting more and more irritated with herself because her eyes were filling with tears and his face was fuzzy now and she couldn't see.

"Good." he added, pulling his notebook close he continued to write.

"Why won't you go?" he had never heard her whine before but he was starting to realize there was a first time for everything.

"Because no, Hinata."

"Demo..."

"Do you remember last time I went to anything hosted with those people?" He finally snapped, and Hinata's eyes didn't stray from his face, not even for a second. "Hai. Of course I do."

He blinked at the intensity of her gaze, surprised to find himself wanting to look away. But he was an Uchiha, he didn't look away. "Then you shouldn't even be asking me to go at all."

Biting her lip Hinata leaned forward slightly, clenching her hands tightly in front of her over top of his books.

"I...I thought it might be different...this time."

"Why?" He grunted, scribbling something down on his notebook. "Nothing has changed."

Hinata stared at him, it was easier when he wasn't looking at her.

"Well... because I thought we would go...together...unlike last time..."

"What does arriving together change?" He shrugged, continuing to transfer notes from one book to his page.

Hinata felt her hands shaking a moment. "I thought..." she paused. "I thought it might, that's all. Because then, if we came together then...Kiba...or whoever wouldn't...wouldn't um..." she stopped, frowning down at her hands. He had stopped writing and was listening intently, clearly starting to see where she was going.

"You... you mean a date..."he whispered, finally looking back up. Hinata however was going to be dying before she looked up at his face. Her heart was ringing with each beat in her ears and she felt a little dizzy.

"N-no...not.. I mean not like..." she paused. What was she doing?

Sasuke leaned back in his chair, waiting, his eyes studying her intently. "You're going to have to clarify. What the hell are you- what about Naruto?"

Surprised at the turn in the conversation and his tone of voice Hinata frowned up at him, mildly annoyed. "What about him?"

A scoff escaped him, despite his initial attempt at remaining calm. "He comes near you and you burst into flame, but you want to go to this thing like it's a date?"

Hinata felt her nose flare, knowing he was going to overstep and already getting irritated with it. "I don't burst into flame around Naruto- I don't, you just haven't-"

"I don't like Naruto's sloppy seconds."

Hinata stood, packing her bag with shaking fingers.

Sasuke turned back to his book, trying to ignore the ringing in his ears.

"Naruto is my friend." her voice was paper thin and had a different tone that he had ever heard before. This wasn't chiding, and this wasn't embarrassed, or sad. He turned to look at her slowly, trying to keep the impassive annoyed look from melting from his face.

"He's my friend, I'm not his sloppy anything. And you- I thought you were my friend too." her eyes flickered away then for a moment to his lips, and then her mouth opened, and words moved to come out but she shut it abruptly it. Cheeks pink she stormed out, letting the door slam uncharacteristically hard on the way out.

Sasuke watched her disappear through the library windows, feeling a panicky thumping in his chest that he realized was his heart careening around in his rib cage angrily.

No. No way, this wasn't how that conversation was going to go.

Abruptly he stood, leaving his mess on the table and running out, storming really, a thunder cloud of irritation dancing around over his head.

"Hyuuga, you wait!" He shouted down the hall, and Hinata who was walking at an extremely fast angry pace glanced back over her shoulder, getting more and more angry by the minute.

"N-nani? No." after a second she threw over her shoulder, loud enough that it surprised them both. "Screw you."

That one actually made Sasuke pause for a second and then he chased after her again, pushing out of the school into the freezing evening air. In the summer at this time the sun would still be out, but now it was bitterly cold and in her hurry she had not put on her jacket or mittens or anything.

Growling angrily at the weather too he finally came up to walk beside her.

"Stop."

"You can't tell me what to do."

"Stop it Hinata, wait."

"You may be Uchiha and everyone just...bows down and does everything you like but I am Hyuuga- i don't have to- nor want to listen to you." Words were coming out of her without any thought and Sasuke found himself surprised to be smirking as he walked along beside her.

"Good, fine, whatever, just stop." He put a hand on her arm.

"Back off, Uchiha." Her books dropped and all of a sudden her stance shifted to the gentle fist, one hand up, keeping him at arms length. It was too cold and she was embarrassed and hurt and more importantly angry. Her eyes strained for a moment and her Byakugan activated, changing her gaze from gentle and kind to serious.

Sasuke paused for a second, incredulous. "You have got to be kidding me."

"I-I-I said back off."

Slowly and with the same lazy swagger he always carried himself in Sasuke raised his chin, hand dangling at his thigh where his kunai were sheathed. "I'm not going to fight you."

"No? Why's your chakra pumping to your eyes for Sharingan then?"

Surprised he blinked at her, and in two blinks his eyes turned a brilliant glow in the dark red.

In the dimness of the evening he looked like something sinister, the snow looked black in the shadows and where they were the trees blocked the lights of the school behind them.

"This is ridiculous, put your Byakugan away."

"Stop. Ordering. Me. Around." Hinata snapped.

"You're going to hurt yourself."

He shouldn't have said it, he knew he shouldn't have said it but he couldn't help it. She was driving him insane with her making him food, and smiling and asking to go to this stupid thing with him and then turning into a beet red tomato the moment Naruto walked by. No. that wasn't okay. He wasn't okay.

She shot forward a lot faster than he would have expected and to his surprise, her fingers, lithe and pale flickered. His sharingan allowed him to see the kick she threw at his head, and he dodged, surprised again by how close it was to actually hitting him.

Letting out a little huff of air he twisted, moving to pin her arm to her back before she could turn around and actually hurt herself, but to his surprise her other arm had come around and grabbed onto his wrist. With a cry she heaved and threw him over her shoulder, expecting, he realized to slam him down onto the ground, but being who he was, his legs wrapped around her waist and together they hit the ground.

In the scuffle that followed there wasn't much of a contest. He was an Uchiha, he was The Uchiha, and before she knew it she was pinned to the ground, he was straddling her waist and holding both arms on either side of her head, panting a little she noticed, thank God. At least it hadn't been easy.

"Get off me."

"What the fuck is going on with you?" he snapped in reply.

"Get off me!"

"Hinata, you-" he stopped.

Her eyes were filling with tears and despite the snow cold against her back and soaking through her clothes her face was flaming. She was looking away pointedly, chest rising and falling in fast angry bursts.

"What the hell is happening to you? What are you doing? You can't fight me." His hands pressed harder into her wrists and she winced. He leaned in close, breathing in each of her gasps, her eyes widening at the proximity. Her breathing sped up, he could feel her chest rising and falling against him.

"S-s-sasuke-"

He studied her, suddenly feeling like it didn't even matter. Here he was with her pinned under him, her hips wriggled beneath his weight and he shivered.

She felt it, it coursed through him and made her stop, holding her breath as he looked at her.

"You're an idiot..." she whispered, feeling the tears start dropping down the side of her face into the snow. "You're no better than that stupid dobe."

He hadn't really allowed himself to think about how it would feel to kiss her because that wasn't something he was willing to entertain not having. So when his lips did press up against hers and she opened up to him, entering his mouth with her tongue he was shocked. He had always assumed that the shy little Hyuuga would turn crimson at a kiss and run away, but to his mixed disbelief and delight her mouth moved against him with fervor, and his grip suddenly lax on her wrists allowed her to bury her hands in his hair, pulling him closer.

She tasted like nothing he had ever had before, it was both sweet and dark, her smell, a mix of sunshine and soap engulfed him.

 _What is happening right now... wait._

Stunned he pulled away abruptly, dragging himself off her in a huff, chest rising and falling so fast he could feel the knock of his heart against the wall of his sternum.

"What are you doing?" He whispered, rubbing his face with one hand.

Hinata sat in the snow, also panting. Her clothes looked like they were in a mess, her shirt was hiked up showing her pale belly and yet pulled down so the whiteness of her cleavage rose and fell with each breath she took.

"I-I-I didn't..." she gasped, struggling to her feet and backing away. "You...you..."

You kissed me she wanted to say.

Sasuke took another step back, finally looking at her. "I'm sorry... I'm sorry, I..." What? He was what?

She waited, eyes trained on him, unable to look away. Her gaze flitted to his mouth, and he felt his fingers touch his own lips, as if surprised they were still there.

"You kissed me back."

Color rushed to her face again, her hands went to her hair, dragging through before rubbing her face hard.

"I... I have to go."

"No- stop." He was grabbing her shoulders then, feeling her shrinking into herself. "Hinata- you-you-"

"I what?" she finally sighed, and he felt her shoulders droop in his grip, her head bowed she pressed a hand to her forehead tiredly, fingers shaking.

Sasuke had never been very good at the talking thing. Before losing his nerve he pulled her chin up, and kissed her again, gently this time. She stood still, one hand up to the soft curve of his collar bone as he caressed her mouth, trailing kisses down her face and neck, his breath sending a shiver down her back as it touched the top of her shirt neck and slipped inside, starting a fire.

"Ah..." she gasped, feeling his hands on her stomach, moving up her shirt. It was cold and she was shivering but she wasn't about to mention that when he was busy pulling her into himself, his fingers sliding across the skin of her back.

Any time she had thought about her first kiss she had been sure she would need a minute to think, but the blood was pumping too fast for that.

"Come home with me, please." The first request in their entire conversation was whispered into her ear as he nibbled on her earlobe. Hinata shivered, unsure of what that meant. Everything about her upbringing said that a no was required but with her heart thumping away in a gallop she nodded.

"O...okay."

He probably could have asked her to fly and she would have tried at this point.

Somehow they made it back to his house, which thankfully wasn't far from the school, and also mercifully empty. He had not even bothered to get his things from the library. Hand gripping her's tightly he had half walked half dragged her home, and upon stumbling into the house turned to her.

He had had some words prepared, something about asking what this was and if she was okay or if he needed to back up but upon removing her jacket, in the half dark of the streetlight coming through his window Hinata took a breath, and removed her shirt too.

Air sucked into his lungs in a way that made him wonder if that was what they were meant for. His chest hurt, and as she slowly undid the button on her pants he began to shake.

Her bra was white, and he had expected something delicate and lacey- when his boy mind had allowed himself a moment of weakness imagining her without clothes. But it was filled to the brim with her, and between her breasts there was a tiny dangling purple stone. It glittered as she moved, pulling her pants down inch by careful inch of her thighs to the floor.

"...Jesus... Hinata... wait... you don't have to-"

"I-I-I know." Slowly she raised the curtain of hair off her neck turning around to him. Her underwear matched her bra in it's simplicity and color and he was having a really hard time processing anything else. "Can you take my necklace off please?"

Slowly he stepped up to her, taking slow measured breaths, in an out, his hands felt hot and cold at the same time as he undid the necklace watching over her shoulder as he slid it off and down her chest between her breasts and to her hand.

Moving with the same terrified slowness Hinata turned around, her fingers reaching for the edge of his shirt and pulling up. Carefully she pulled it over his head, letting it drop to the ground beside them.

He studied her every expression, watching as her fingers hesitated for a moment and then carefully begun to undo his belt.

The buckle clattered as it landed on the floor and he stepped out of the pants carefully, feeling her hair caress his arms as she stepped into his personal space.

It felt like electricity in the half an inch between their bodies was flickering to and from them. Biting her lip painfully she whispered. "I-I'm...I've never..." she let out a breath at the feel of his hands on her hips, skin to skin with nothing to buffer the way it made her feel. Goosebumps broke out over her shoulders and slowly he moved his hands up her sides, over the curve of her breasts to her arms, rubbing her shoulders gently.

"It's okay... we... we can stop whenever you..."

"I don't want to stop..." she shook her head and her bangs tickled his face as he pulled her in. Her stomach was smooth and soft against him and the curve of her chest was making it hard for him to get enough air.

"Okay." He nodded, one slow up and down. "Okay..." delicately he pressed his mouth to hers, sliding his hands back down to her hips before picking her up.

Lips locked and with her legs wrapped around his waist he flexed his arms, tightening his grip on her torso he walked into his room, lowering her carefully onto the bed, well aware that she wasn't moving her legs from around him but tightening and pulling in hard.

Her voice let out a sound that he had heard before as he let his mouth wander from her lips to her neck onto her collar bone and down, to the curve of her breasts, and suddenly he knew why her calling him Sasu both terrified and irritated him so much.

It was the sound of his name unfinished, interrupted by wanton moans.

"Sasu...sasu...sasuke...oh..." her lips were pink and soft and delicious and they pouted with every unfinished attempt at his name, struggling to put a label on the burning that had begun in the depths of her body.

He was completely and utterly undone, completely filled with wonder.

* * *

 _ **ALSO much longer than i anticipated- seesh!**_

 _ **Part Two done. I think I am going to do a much shorter part three just for fun with the next prompt word which is Loveable.**_

 _ **After that we're back to one shots.**_

 _ **Leave me some love, ne?**_

 _ **-Inky**_


	4. Chapter 4

_**Rain Drops**_

 _ **Part Three**_

 _ **Loveable**_

 _ **disclaimer: I do not own naruto.**_

She lay in the half light of the forest trees, watching through closed lids as the filtered gasps of sun flashed overhead sending orange and gold into her mind.

Dozing she smiled, delighted by the feel of the heat and the tender carress of the summer breeze.

Languidly she stretched a satisfied cat-like flex of muscle and grace before settling again on the blanket she had spread over the mossy soft ground.

He found her there that day, and paused at a distance, studying her as she moved. In his hand he gripped something, tight as he could until his knuckles hurt and he wondered if he could possibly shatter the smooth surface.

She was easily the most terrifying thing he had ever seen in that moment. Her white dress was smooth over her body, accenting angles in her ankles and knees, the smooth curve of her calves and up to the more delicious curves higher up. Half asleep in the warmth she was relaxed and every limb seemed to be well oiled when she shifted, nothing stilted or jittery about her. Nothing scared.

He was scared.

His heart was doing a double time gallop in his chest, like a hummingbird it fluttered and for a moment longer he lingered in the shadows, watching as she rolled onto her back and stretched one pale arm up against the brightness of the light, watching the warmth of the sun filter through her fingers.

How had he come to this, really? She had been there his entire life. He remembered bumping into her in kindergarden and being unaffected, had been uninterested in her examinations as they moved further up into their respective ranks. She just wasn't part of his circle, tightly knit for the sake of focus. He had a job to do, he was an Uchiha.

But how was he ever going to live after doing his job? Everything about his life thus far had been focused with entirety on that goal, achieving it as soon as possible, accomplishing quickly and with ease what would take a monumental effort to anyone else.

Once the point in the distance came and went, what would there be for him? A void, vast and empty?

Or...

"Sasu?"

He shuddered, the tremble starting at his shoulders and down his back, making him swallow. It almost felt like pain sometimes, that shudder. Almost.

Stepping out from behind the tree he started forward slowly, keeping his eyes down. In his head he said it was because the sun was so bright in the particular patch of forest she had picked for her rendevouz but he knew more than anything he was scared. If he looked up he would break.

"Hi," Her voice was feather soft and where most people would start chattering endlessly she waited until he came to settle beside her. He brought the coolness of the forest shadows with him, his skin more damp from the woodland wetness than warm. She brought the soothing sleepy heat of the summer sun and as usual he lost all control at her smell. Instead of a polite calm hello he buried his face into her neck, drinking in the feel of her skin beneath his lips and the giggle that escaped her as he pushed her down, settling with his face on her shoulder, against the silk of her hair.

Still unable to meet her gaze he trailed his hands gently up along her torso to her ribcage, and lingered for a moment higher up, making her breath catch before gripping her fingers.

"Hello." He finally whispered. His bones felt like jelly, and the same relaxed sleepiness she was covered in seemed to affect him double time.

Hinata blinked at him, unaffected by the sheen of pink on her face. "A...are you okay?"

"Certainly."

"Okay." feeling the bit of tension in her body leave she curled up against him, feeling his hair tickling her face.

In the stillness she could hear the birds calling to each other in the thickets and the smell of heather from a field further off wafted through the clearing on the backs of dandelion spores floating through the sunlight.

Eyes half lidded she smiled, so incredibly happy she could feel the pain in her chest expanding and hurting deliciously.

"I brought you lunch if you want." she whispered after a time of listening to his breathing and watching the dust that drifted like gold in the light.

Sasuke shook his head slowly against her neck for a moment.

Detecting tension across his back Hinata stilled, listening. Not wanting to be a nuisance she didn't enquire again but looked at him through her lashes thoughtfully, a splinter of worry festering in her mind.

"We can't... keep meeting like this."

His words seem to change the tone of the sunlight from gold to a deep navy blue. She blinked and in that moment the heat seemed to leave and she felt a shiver travel through her body at the touch of the breeze.

Unmoving she stared up at the heavens, watching lazy white clouds go by, wondering if they would start crying.

"...ano..." she began slowly, surprised that her voice was working. His fingers kept playing idly with her own, twisting them and turning them and watching the elegance of each joint in motion.

"What do you...what do you mean?"

Sasuke shrugged, half hearted in his attempt to communicate. His heart was beating hard in his chest and he felt himself grip in his pocket the smooth hard thing that would change his life. One way or the other.

Still unable to move HInata felt her breath starting to pick up pace and attempted against all odds to calm it. _I'm misunderstanding... He's not..._

"I don't think it's wise." he continued after a long painful pause and Hinata closed her eyes against the brightness of the sky. The breeze was no longer friendly and it was leeching the warmth from her bones. Only his body presented some semblance of comfort but she couldn't move to fit herself around him as before. Shivering she clenched her jaw.

"...s-s-so...so now...?" she paused, unable to continue her words. Now what? You never speak to me again?

"What do you think we should do?" Sasuke's voice was so smooth and matter of fact. Not a shake in his tone not a tremble in his candence.

Her throat felt tight.

"I...I...I..." she paused, and breathed, trying to make her mouth feel less dry.

"We're going to get caught." he continued, and suddenly his warmth left her body, making her shake with the sudden lack of heat. And maybe something else.

"Neji or Sakura or someone will get suspicious and...we'll get caught and then what?" Sasuke kept his eyes on his hands where he played against with her fingers, aware suddenly of their cold tips.

He finally looked up to see her face and froze, surprised.

Tears welled up making her gaze sparkle in a dazzling array of lavender and gray shades. Slowly she withdrew her hand, clasping them tightly in front of her as she sat up. The smooth relaxed movements of her body were gone. In jarring stilted paces she sat, drawing her legs underneath her and smoothing out the long skirt of her dress to cover herself.

"I suppose...that's true." she conceded.

Sasuke searched her face, trying to figure out what was happening.

"Hinata..." he began slowly, moving to touch her, surprised to find her pulling back half an inch, eyes lowering to the ground.

He stopped, brows furrowed.

"...I'm just concerned. We haven't been...exactly discreet." he mumbled, remembering with a rapid flush of his face the last time they had met at this particular spot, how hard he had breathed against her neck, how she had gasped and tried to stifle his name as it ripped from her throat with his lips.

His hand gripped the blanket beneath him especially hard for a moment, attempting to shake the memory out of his head.

"No, I... I understand." Hinata lied, confusion eating her up like she was a log in a fire. How had this happened? Had she done something wrong? Maybe he had not meant any of the words he had so heatedly whispered to her in the dark?

"Do you?" Realization was starting to dawn on his face, and for a moment HInata confused it for relief. The tears were making it hard to see clearly but in an attempt to keep from crying she nodded, refusing to blink.

 _I figured I wasn't good enough for this._

 _I couldn't possibly be for someone like him._

 _For anyone._

"You," Sasuke sighed, reaching out to touch her cheek, forcing her to blink and let the tears slide down her smooth face. ", are adorable."

Hinata clenched her eyes shut tight, pressing her chin hard into her knees. "O-onegai..." she shook her head just a little. "Don't be mean."

"Hinata." there was a slight stern tone to his voice and wincing she flickered her eyes open to him as he shifted to pull her knees down, pulling her firmly into his lap.

"I'm sorry!" she began, feeling her voice wobble, the tears once unleashed her pouring now and studying her intently Sasuke wiped her cheek with his thumb. "I always...I always said...I would... do...whatever...I needed to...to make you...happy..." Hinata gasped softly.

 _I just always hoped it wouldn't be letting you go._

Eyes widening slightly Sasuke sighed. "Oh, Hina."

"It's okay." She nodded firmly, proud that she hadn't stuttered at least one small sentence. Roughly she wiped her face with her hand. "I...I know my family is difficult, and I never thought you would want to hide this forever, I knew that, I just-"

"I just came from your house, Hina."

Freezing, Hinata stared at him, eyes wide. "What?"

"I just came from your house, from speaking with your father."

Since graduation had come and gone they had had to get creative, finding different places to be together than just his home. At first the friendship with the Uchiha had been a source of curiousity for the family, and then after getting used to her comings and goings it had been uninteresting. But the moment graduation happened her time was suddenly no longer her own. Where are you going? Who are you seeing? When will you be back?

Lying had never been a skill she was great at, especially to her father and cousin but now she could admit with great embarassment that she had become better at the art of deception due to this particular aspect of her life.

The worry that Sasuke would grow weary of her family and their demands on her time, and her fear of their rejection of their relationship had always troubled her in moments of solitude but addressing it had always seemed like an unwise idea. They were so new, only half a year if you counted from the moment he had so aggressively pinned her down and kissed her.

Too new to beg him to not leave her.

"They found out?" she whispered with horror, feeling the pit of her stomach drop to her toes. Losing Sasuke was one thing, losing him and facing her family's stern disappointment on the same day were quite another thing. Feeling sick she lowered her head into her hands. "Oh no."

"Actually." Sasuke murmured, pulling out the box from his pocket. "I told them."

Hinata pressed her fingers harder into her face, breathing in sharp quick bursts. _He didn't just say that. Surely he didn't just..._

"N-n-nani! Sasuke- why would you-?" the shock died on her lips when she looked up, offered in a smooth pale wooden box a glittering thing that caught the light from the sun.

"I asked them, if they thought I might be able to ask you to marry me."

Unbreathing Hinata stared first at the ring, it's smooth white gold intricacies of vines, holding within their grip tiny sparkling diamonds among the twist and turns of metal.

"Your father..." Sasuke continued as she stared in complete stillness. "...he wasn't very pleased at first that we had been sneaking around for a bit but I can be persuasive when I want to be..."

Not a word, not a word escaped her lips.

"...and Neji, he didn't seem surprised. To be honest I would be stunned if he hadn't known all along, he's probably the most perceptive person I know."

Slowly she raised her eyes to his face. _Is this some awful joke? Am I really so silly to be teased this way?_

Seeing her unwillingness to speak Sasuke continued, finding himself particularly talkative in his terrified moment.

"They decided that an engagement was acceptable, but that it couldn't be a long one, despite how young we are. They didn't want people talking..."

Finally feeling himself losing his grip he pressed his forehead to her own, harder than he intended, holding her with his hands buried in her hair, breathing in the same air.

"Please, my God, HInata... please... please tell me I didn't make a mistake. Please tell me you'll marry me."

"You... you want to marry me?" Still in disbelief Hinata blinked, searching his face as if looking for a sign of foul play. "D-demo... I thought... I thought you were leaving me..."

Sasuke sighed. "Never."

"But I'm not... I'm... you want me to marry you?"

Holding her face in his hands tightly he nodded. "Please."

"Sasuke. I didn't think I was loveable enough for that."

Surprised Sasuke blinked. "Well you are."

"I...I..."

"You are. I love you, theres nothing about you I don't love."

Eyes wide Hinata felt herself smile through her tears. "How could you possibly think I would ever even consider saying no?"

For once in his life Sasuke felt himself grin, the tension exploding from his muscles and turning into frantic spastic energy.

"You just said yes."

"H-h-hai!"

"You just said yes."

"Hai! Hai!"

And suddenly the sun was warm again.

 _ **Can you say, Fluff?**_

 _ **Leave me some love, ne?**_

 _ **-inky**_


	5. Chapter 5

_**Rain Drops**_

 _ **Chapter 5**_

 _ **Bubbles**_

 _ **We are back to One Shots unless... you know, for whatever reason this one decides to push to be a stream of one shots again. Sometimes stories just come out kicking and screaming instead of nice and docile.**_

 _ **disclaimer: I do not own naruto.**_

* * *

Walking through the town was not usually something Sasuke Uchiha did. He was young and he bright eyed and he was happy, and being Uchiha he was recognizable. There was something about him that made girls eyes turn to pink hearts at the sight of him, and although he found them mildly annoying- like his parents had always told him he tried his best to be polite and kind, despite their advances.

In order to avoid the type of confrontrations he had unfortunately been a part of before he had taken to going through the woodland surrounding the town, going the roundabout way that included passing the back of the Hyuuga Estate nestled so close to city center.

It's bright white walls were always a curiosity to him as he meandered through the edges of their territory, studying with interest the tiles that decorated the high walls with their family crest.

Unlike his Clan compound, which was further on the outskirts this particular family was entrenched in City politics and as a result extremely anxious. Their Byakugan pale eyes were all seeing and it seemed to him, even as a young child that seeing everything would only really make a person nervous. Sometimes there were things one simply didn't want to see, surely?

This particular day he was heading towards Konoha Elementary with the intent of studying what the students there were up to. Soon he would be joining their ranks, although not quite yet but he had heard from people commenting to his parents throughout his life that his brother had surpassed all expectations during the very first year he had attended school.

Rubbing his forehead hard he sighed. How was he ever going to be able to manage such a feat? Nii-san was so amazing and he was just... well he was just himself. He was little and he was a little scared too, and Nii-san didn't seem to be scared of anything, ever.

Walking distractedly through the trees he blinked and froze, walking headlong into a fat round sparkling bubble in the dim afternoon sun.

POP.

Wincing he covered his eyes, struggling to get the soap off his lashes. "Ack!"

Blinking black obsidian eyes he squinted in the light and froze.

Around him a storm of bubbles rained, appearing out of thin air, their smooth glistening shapes drifting lazily in the wind, around him, above him, popping on the rough forest terrain at his feet.

Wide eyed, an involuntary grin starting at the edges of his face he spun, looking up.

"Wow."

His eyes followed the trail of soap and air, watching the pearls appearing at the boundary, near the lip of the compound wall, from a tiny pale hand clenching the edge of the wall, and a bubble wand waving in the air above.

Slowly he meandered towards it, stepping back until a dark haired head appeared, and then a pair of smooth tiny brows, and pale lavender eyes above the round smooth cheeks and nose of a tiny baby Hyuuga.

Startled the little one jumped, and then blushed crimson lowering herself until only her pink cheeks and eyes appeared above the wall, studying him.

"Hi!" he called, waving slightly. "You made so many bubbles!"

He waved his arm around as if to point them all out. "Look!"

The girl seemed surprised by his comment and pushed up a bit at the wall, watching him with cautious interest.

"H-hai!"

"Can you make more?"

"Hai!"

A grin flashed over her face, a mirror image of the one on his, and like only children can, instant friendship bloomed.

Moving delicately so that the dangling hair piece on her black hair glittered in the sun the girl heaved herself up onto the wall edge, moving slowly in her little kimono of purple and white.

Sasuke stared, stunned as she sat with her tiny little legs dangling on the edge, pulling a little jar of water and soap up onto her lap from behind her.

"W-w-watch!" she called, tongue sticking out in concentration as she waved it slowly through the lazy afternoon sun.

A fat bubble began to form and when the breeze took into it's mind to pass through the wand mouth it grew, and grew and grew in time with the two children's huge expanding eyes.

"WOW!" Sasuke gasped, stunned.

"A-a-a-a-no! It's gonna pop!" Her tiny voice hit a surprisingly high terrified squeak and Sasuke shook his head. "No, no! Just stay calm!"

With a final sigh the breeze twisted away and the bubble dislodged, and the girl who had been leaning forward in her eagerness realized she was too far forward, and flailed.

Had her kimono not been so restrictive, perhaps she could have used her body weight and flexibility to grab onto the ledge, regain her balance and save herself.

But alas the pull of gravity and the restraint of the fabric made her gasp and feeling the hard solid edge of the ledge give way beneath her fingers she closed her eyes, feeling her tummy drop out from under her.

With a crash and a cry that made the birds scatter into the sky from the nearby trees she lay on something soft and squishy, wincing at the pain on her back and side. "Owwww." her chin wobbled for a moment and tears stun her eyes and when she finally opened them she stared.

The boy was beneath her, covered in pine needles and looking a little worse for wear, one cheek scratched and a little bit of blood coming out of his nose.

Eyes widening the girl gasped, scrambling off of his body in a hurry. "Gomen! Gomen! Gomen nasai!"

A laugh escaped him with a cough and eyes widening at something behind her he grabbed her hand to turn her towards where his eyes were looking.

"There!" He gasped, wincing a bit as he pointed.

Up above the treeline the enormous bubble drifted lazily in the wind, up and up and up into the azure blue of the heavens.

The girl's grip on his hand was vice tight, but her eyes were on the sky. "Oh wow!" she whispered. "It... it didn't pop!"

"We did it!" He added with a grin, turning to look at her and pausing.

Eyes filled with tears she studied him, chin wobbling again. "I-I'm so sorry I hurt you!"

Startled he moved to sit up and then paused, contemplating the shooting pain on his side. "No! No, I'm fine, see!" He sat up, and with a monumental effort for a five year old pushed himself to his feet, dragging her with him, partly to get her up partly to use her hand to steady himself.

Staring with disbelief at him the girl sniffed, rubbing her face with her now dirty kimono sleeve. "A-a-are you sure?"

"Hai." He nodded. "I'm okay. And anyway." He turned back to the bubble drifting further and further away. "That was an epic bubble!"

A grin faltered for a moment on her face before expanding and making him stare. "H-hai!"

"Who are you anyway?" He whispered, suddenly feeling a little dizzy.

A blush shot through her face for a moment. "I-I am Hinata... Hinata Hyuuga."

"Ohaiyo." he murmured, studying her so intently that the blush grew deeper. Together they jumped at the sound of someone shouting out.

"Hinata-sama!"

"Hinata-sama!"

Startled the kids looked up in time to see several pale eyed people looking with panic down below.

"Hinata-sama! Are you okay?"

"I-I-I'm all right, I-"

"Don't move!"

And before she could even blink hands were suddenly taking a hold of her as members of her household jumped down the high wall, landing with expert ease on the ground. Sasuke stiffened as they pulled him aside, picking Hinata up as though to remove her from vermin.

"Whose this?"

"One of the Uchihas, by the look of that fan."

"What were you doing here?"

Stung, Sasuke stepped back, starting to walk away before he got in trouble somehow.

"He-he caught me!" Hinata was crying, struggling to peer over the shoulder of the man who held her in her arms as he started to walk away back towards the entrance of the compound. "He helped!"

Sasuke looked back over his shoulder for a moment, meeting the pale eyes filled with tears for a moment curiously, offering her a shy little smile before waving.

Startled Hinata blinked, rubbing tears away angrily before waving back, and disappearing at the turn of the compound wall.

A little bruised Sasuke stumbled on, back towards home. It was too late now and he was too sore to watch the other students working on their shinobi work.

And he wanted to ask his mother something anyway. He wanted to know who the Hyuuga were. And what their relationship was like with his Clan. He needed to know everything he possibly could about them. Everything.

Because he had decided he wanted to marry one one day.

* * *

 _ **leave me some love, ne?**_

 _ **inky**_


	6. Chapter 6

_**Rain Drops**_

 _ **New**_

 _ **Sorry... this one took an unexpected ItaHinaSasu turn that I didn't see coming at all. I just needed to get it out of my head.**_

 _ **Much love,**_

 _ **Inky**_

* * *

The sound of the cello and the violin tuning was grating and yet it seemed to fit with the tinkle of the glasses, the pouring of wine, the whispered voices and the muted gentle laughs.

In the Uchiha compound there was rarely occasion for parties, there was too much to do, too much to strive for.

The piano however still seemed to suit the mood, as did the cello, the violin and the glittering lights strung across the street, covering the darkness in twinkles that were more aggressive than the stars above. Although perhaps not quite as pretty.

Tables dotted the court yard, and in the moon light and warmth of the lights there was the feeling of being half asleep, watching something beautiful through tear soaked lashes, the light filtering through the liquid.

In the shadows he stood, watching as the guests began to filter in, one, two at a time, their daughters standing tall, their dresses billowing in the soft summer night breeze. On their necks the jingle of expensive jewelry meshed with the instruments beginning the soft and melodramatic play of sound.

Beside him his brother felt him tense, and he smiled, a little amusement marring the otherwise sympathetic expression. "Don't be so stiff, Itachi. Many men would be excited by the prospect of meeting a wife so easily."

"Like a cattle show." Itachi whispered, watching as the young women were presented first to his mother, and then his father, their elegant swan bows making him sigh. They were all beautiful, so calling them cattle had been in bad form and even his little brother standing beside him winced at it.

But it felt unfair, not just to him, but to them also.

"They're all wonderful." He conceded, and his brother nodded. "They're all... the same."

"Naruto said that if you don't feel fear when you see her then she's not the one." Sasuke murmured. "It's one of the only things I've actually thought sounded sane coming out of his mouth on the first try."

Itachi almost chuckled, but the laugh died in his throat, just as his brother let out a sound that, shockingly seemed close to a gasp.

She entered the party alone. Perhaps she was more assured than the others, or perhaps she had been sent this way, to cause a stir. Unaccompanied she walked slowly forward, and among the bright reds, blues, pinks and teals of the other young ladies she stood out in white.

White was the color of mourning, of snow, and it surprised him that someone would wear such a dress, and yet it didn't. She owned it. It had grown on her, like her skin. There was no other way she could have come to have it. It wrapped around her hips, upwards along her torso, hugging the shape of her silhouette. The gentle ruffles of the skirt moved like the ocean as she stepped, fluttering softly, and the lace entwined to hug her. A scoop neck revealed the provocative curve of her collarbone, the delicate shape of her shoulders, the smooth stretch of her neck.

"...who...?" He had meant to start asking but Sasuke beat him to it. The Uchiha brothers stood transfixed as the pale eyed dark haired dream wandered from the entrance towards their parents. Unlike the rest her hair was not up, it tumbled down her back in soft delicate curls. A small elegant glitter of a decorative comb hung near her bangs, shimmering in the lights as she moved.

"...the eyes." Sasuke whispered again, beating him once more to the punch. "Hyuuga."

"Hyuuga..?" Itachi whispered, and he felt himself step forward, his brother right at his elbow, and together they studied each other. For the first time they stared back and forth, forgetting all the pranks and shoves, the giggles in the bath as children. They analyzed each other's broad shoulders, the high cheek bones and dark hair that defined masculinity.

Had they ever craved the same things? Yes. Their father's approval. Their Clan's dominance, glory for their bloodline.

Nothing they couldn't share, if just done the right way but this...

Sasuke felt himself smirk, the mirror image beginning on his older brother's face. "This is your party, your cattle show." He murmured, moving to bow out, despite the flutter of panic that was beginning in his stomach.

Itachi studied him, wondering if he should take such a blatant retreat. Could he really press his advantage?

His eyes moved through the crowd, finding her easily like a pearl sitting in a box of bright buttons, glowing and reflecting the light. Her bow was small and graceful, her hands fluttering with nerves along the smooth waterfall of her white skirt as she moved.

"It wouldn't be a competition... if you just bowed out." Itachi whispered softly, and Sasuke allowed himself to look again, to feast on her as she moved away from their parents, her eyes moving from face to face quickly. One small hand lingered near her collarbone. He breathed in deep, wondering how it would feel to run his finger tips along the length of it too.

"We've never competed this way." Sasuke whispered back, and watched in fascination as her eyes seemed to raise, seemed to feel them on her, touching the smoothness of her neck with their dark Uchiha gaze.

"You're right." Itachi admitted, and felt her Hyuuga eyes linger first on him, and then on Sasuke, cheeks brightening to a beautiful painful pink, making him bite his lip.

"Will we be okay?" Sasuke continued, feeling himself compelled to move forward, watching her turning away. Her nerves getting the best of her. Her curtain of black hair slid across her shoulders as she turned and he restrained himself from walking over to push it away. He wanted to better study the indent at the small of her back, up to the sculpted shape of her shoulder blades bared by the deep curve of the dress neckline.

Itachi was noting the same things, a knot starting in his throat he had never felt before. "Of course we will." Nothing could separate them. They were Uchiha, they were brothers, they were...staring.

With the black of the night behind her and the glitter of the lights above she glowed, the sea of colorful fabrics around her swirling as the music began to pick up tempo, aiming for the dancing to begin.

"You're the eldest." Sasuke murmured finally. "You go first."

Itachi watched as she looked over her shoulder, her chin lighting on the smooth fabric of her dress for a moment as she peered at them, the heat that engulfed her face was now rushing up the smooth white neck and over her chest. He swallowed.

"Fine."

"Are you nervous?" Sasuke's voice was not mocking, genuinely concerned. His brother was never nervous. His brother was never scared.

His brother wasn't replying.

This was new.

Their gazes turned back to each other again, studying the familiar Uchiha black with surprise, and then chagrin.

"First time for everything." They both whispered, and Itachi stepped forward, watching as her eyes lit up with curiosity and then trepidation as the first brother approached. Behind him the younger waited impatiently for a try at the prize.

This was just a game. It was a new one and they would tire of it. She would open her mouth and her beauty would seem hollow, they would both sigh and move on in defeat, waiting again for something to console their loneliness, their exhaustion at seeing nothing that fit, that rang, that spoke _to_ them and not _of_ them.

"Good evening, Ms. Hyuuga." His hand hovered above the small of her back as he encircled her in his presence and her eyes fluttered up and then back down, cheeks reddening at his closeness, the feel of his body heat moving just above the surface of her skin, dancing.

"Mr. Uchiha." And she moved, it wasn't a bow, it wasn't a curtsy, it was an acquiesce of his existence, and it was beautiful.

"I was unaware you were on the guest list, I was...pleasantly surprised." He murmured and watched as her eyes lifted, her blush permanent now as the paleness of her gaze met his dark.

The advantageous-ness of the marriage was known to all. The likelihood of him not knowing she was on the guest list was nearly zero, but the flirting had to be done according to protocol. Any other young lady would have been giggling and holding on to his arm, whispering something about being glad to be a surprise worth having.

As he and Sasuke listened she cocked her head, just a small half an inch motion to the right, setting the head piece within the darkness of her hair glittering.

"It's all right, ." And although there was no stutter there was a slight hesitation in her words. "I think we both know... how unpleasant this is as a rule."

Itachi breathed in, trying to calm himself because five minutes prior he would have been agreeing but he could smell her in the stillness of the night. And as the breeze whispered through her dress it lingered in his nose, the scent of snow, of honeysuckle and soap.

"It's...not as bad as I had anticipated." he admitted slowly, watching her gaze slide up along the length of his throat and to his eyes.

"Oh." She blinked at him, and her eyes smiled, setting a wash of fear coursing through him with her innocence. "Perhaps you have been lucky enough to find who you were hoping to?"

All he could think of in that moment was a curse, a soft frightened curse within his mind as her face lit from the inside with her joy for him, her hope that he had found exactly who he had been hoping to find.

"Perhaps." He sighed, and his dark eyes shot upwards to meet his brother's. He too was smiling, a serious worried half grin.

What did he say again?

 _...if you don't feel fear..._

The terror moved through him as she placed a small delicate hand on his arm. As though jolted his brother moved forward to join them, making her turn, her eyes lighting with recognition and another smile, as comforting and kind as the one she had fixed on him.

 _I'm terrified._

 _You're a scream within my mind, but in yours I am silence._

Sasuke leaned forward, his cheek coming to level with hers, setting her face on fire as he whispered something and Itachi took a deep breath to step back, if only a little.

"...th-thank you..." Her whisper was trembling and for a second her eyes flickered to Itachi's and then back to Sasuke and away to the ground. Watching the exchange he wondered what was more frightening. The fact that she was so loud inside his head, or the idea that maybe he wasn't as quiet in hers as he had originally thought.

Sasuke's gaze flickered to his brother as well, at the triangle their bodies made, and the tension that had suddenly appeared to linger in the air like the whisper of plum blossoms that tossed through the summer breeze.

"This sort of thing must be familiar for you, Ms. Hyuuga." Sasuke continued, noting that his elder brother was currently unable to speak. "We have not hosted a Courting Party at the Uchiha Estate before."

"...I have had a few." she admitted slowly. "My father... wants to know the suitors well before making a decision."

"Hm." Itachi nodded, and looked back at his brother again, usually a face that brought him calm was now making him worry and likewise Sasuke smirked at him, feeling the same gnawing panic in his stomach at her words.

"This is quite new for us."

"Yes." Itachi finally managed, his voice allowing him to speak again in her presence. "Quite new."

Hinata's gaze flitted back and forth between the two brothers and she took a deep shuddering breath.

 _I think... this is new for all us._

And she knew she was right when they both reached for her hand at the same time.

* * *

 _ **leave me some love, ne?**_

 _ **Inky**_


	7. Chapter 7

_**Corruption**_

 _ **A.N**_

 _ **I rather enjoyed the last one shot, and I realize there's a lot of people who would be happy for an Ita/Hina/Sasu story... I haven't got a multi chapter sorted in my head. I just finished Runaway, and I'm finishing Paint With Words so I'm trying to not distract myself with another one yet lol, maybe something will come up though.**_

 _ **I've never done a harem fic yet, and I'm tempted to try except for that I am unsure who I would want to win and that makes me hesitate... I have to know who is going to end up with Hina or I won't be able to write it and at the moment I can't decide O_O**_

 _ **If I do write an Ita/Hina/Sasu it won't be a long multi chapter. It'll be max ten.**_

 _ **Keep reviewing, maybe I'll keep thinking about it ;)**_

 _ **Much love,**_

 _ **Inky**_

* * *

There was no way.

He stared at her as she entered the cave, the drip of the dirty putrid water trickling over the stones was almost pretty, tinkling over the rock and into the pools that lined the cave on either side.

He stared because there was no way, it couldn't be her. Yet there she was.

Her hair was soaked, and it curled at the ends and her bangs twisted in tendrils around her face, spills of kanji ink against her white cheeks. The pale eyes of the Hyuuga clan studied carefully the entrance of the cave mouth and started as they landed on him, surprise and then hesitation scrambling over her features.

The clothes on her body clung to her, wet and plastered to her there was little left to the imagination and he realized he had been away for a long time. In his memory she fluttered like a moth, white and billowing in a large sweater, her pale eyes timid, her hands always fidgeting in front of her.

This was not the same being. Slowly, with only the slightest hint of uncertainty she lowered herself to a fighting stance, her eyes darkening and the veins sharpening against the smooth delicate skin of her temples.

"Uchiha." She breathed the word the way one would when encountering a deer in the forest and she swallowed painfully, waiting for his response.

This was his cave. His sanctuary and he was dumbfounded that she was there. Had she found it with her Byakugan? Why would a Konoha shinobi team send their tracker forward instead of keeping them safe?

It didn't matter either way. His eyes shifted in the darkness, from midnight black to the agonized red of his clan, glowing in the shadows towards her, listening to her heart beating even among the thundering of the waterfall behind her.

Drip drip drip the water trickled, and he moved.

She sucked in air, and her hands lifted to block the attack coming at her, but there was no hope for her, there never had been. He was who he was, and few could stand to keep up.

The smack to her neck sent her body crumbling and before she landed on the solidity of the cave floor his arm languidly caught her body, studying the paleness of her skin, the droplets of water sliding over the curve of her jaw and down, tears in reverse heading upward.

 _What are you doing here?_

His eyes moved backwards to the curtain of water that separated him from the rest of the world, and he pondered where the rest of her team was.

Well, it didn't matter. He would be ready for them. Lowering her carefully to the ground he paused, watching again as the moisture slid over her skin, from the curve of her cheek down, past her jaw line, to her neck, nestling into the black of hair.

* * *

They never came.

She woke hours later and there was still no intrusion. The sun had vanished and in the cave the light was impossible to find, there was only the sound of the water. He knew she woke from the change in her breath, the steady slow in and out of unconsciousness giving way to a more controlled distinct sound.

The sound of barely managed fear.

"You can see me in the dark, I assume." He murmured, sitting with his knee up gazing out past the tendrils of water from the waterfall, uncaring as she shifted on the ground. He wondered briefly what it would be like to see the chakra moving within a body. Was it like fireworks against the black of the sky? Was it like fireflies lazily shifting in the grasses at night? Or was it blood, a steady stream of energy that pulsed with his heart?

Softly, her answer was concise, and he appreciated the brevity.

"Yes."

"Good. You will tell me now where the rest of your comrades are." And his gaze turned to her in the shadows and she did not have to wonder where he would be if she shut her Byakugan down. In the black only his gaze glowed, and although there was the stunning terror of facing a demon in the dark she couldn't help it.

Like rubies, the sharingan gaze glittered at her and she swallowed, amazed by their beauty.

"I have no comrades."

"I do not take well to lies."

"I am...a defector."

"I will not warn you again."

She could see it, the swirling of the chakra, and if he had known he would have asked her to describe it. More like fireworks and paint than anything the colors shifted, and went from blue to dark agonized purple within his body, they traveled in splutters and swirls, in twists and turns, and when he became aggravated with her answer she watched the twisting pools of energy erupt like lava within him, bubbling.

"...no one has come for me. There is no one to search." Something about her words sounded wounded and he stared through the black at her, puzzling out the tone in her voice.

"...but I see a chakra point heading towards us from the west." Her voice surprised him when it continued, and he turned towards the waterfall again, parting the curtain of liquid with the sheath of his sword like fabric. Through the sudden partition the moonlight snapped to attention, flooding the cave with blue light that traveled down and into the throat of the cave, lighting her face as she stared into the sky, her Byakugan gaze focused on the distance.

"...Deidara." She whispered. "And another form I do not know. Ten, maybe eight minutes away if there is no wind resistance to his birds."

He watched her, brow furrowed for a moment before turning back to the sky where against the blue black of the night sky he could see just the smallest smudge of a shadow in the direct line of the moon's light.

 _Perhaps... she could be useful._

* * *

He had not intended for her to be dragged into the fight but being found with him tended to get people dragged into things whether they or he liked it or not. She was wounded, and more severely than he had anticipated. Her ability to recon was not matched by her ability to defend herself. At least not against the likes of someone like Deidara or Sasori.

He carried her on his back and wondered briefly about the wetness of her blood seeping into his clothing. It would be easy, in this moment to put her down, to walk away, to let her bleed and then slowly die alone in the forest, succumbing to the natural order of things. It wouldn't be so difficult as it was to carry her to his next hideout, the stitch the wound closed, to cauterize it with fire.

The thoughts of putting her down continued to nag in his head as the grass of the forest tickled around his legs but he didn't. She had jumped to his defense, had taken a kunai to the hip and had it been an inch lower would have bled out in minutes not the long hours that awaited her. The choice would have been out of his hands, but alas. It was what it was for now.

A sound escaped her on his shoulder and he turned his head the briefest bit to the right, listening to her soft moan.

"...p..put me down."

He almost scoffed at the incredulity of her request considering his thoughts on the matter. "Believe me when I say you do not want me to do that."

"...I'm dying."

He didn't deny it. But he continued on, his eyes lighting on the moon through the broken branches of the trees above, the travel of her pale face along the sky told him that he would soon be at his destination and even if she did die at least this one miserable thing would not linger on his conscience.

She whimpered when he raised the fire with katon, cutting at her clothing with his knife, exposing the smooth flesh ripped from the bite of the kunai, the blood pumping unhealthily against the paleness of her skin.

There would be no stitching that. In the darkness of the shack he used to recover he breathed in deep and lighting the knife to a brilliant red hot brand he looked at her, watching as her face twisted with the realization of what he was going to do.

Her mouth opened, and he expected that she was going to beg him not to.

"Thank you."

When he pressed the blade to her skin she shrieked, and jerked against him and then relaxed as the pain overwhelmed her and threw her into the depths of sleep.

He watched again as sweat now, rather than water slid over the pearl of her skin, along the smoothness of her throat, down the curve of her collarbone, and into the depths of her clothing.

* * *

There had never been a discussion about her leaving. He never mentioned it, and after waiting a couple of days for her to manage her pain she had unceremoniously stitched her clothing, wrapped her wounds in bandages he provided and without a word followed him.

At first he was unsure about the shadow he had gained, but her pace was commendable. There was never a complaint, nor a word, from her unless he spoke to her first and he began to ponder what she was doing.

But as she never asked him, he never thought to ask her.

Together they traversed hectares of land, moving through the darkness of the forest at night, sleeping little, eating less.

Her eyes managed to shift him from incoming ninja, including he noted, those of Konoha. If she had lied about her defecting it would be hard not to believe her now.

Sitting quietly on one of the stones by the stream he had picked to be their campsite for the evening she watched as without effort he scooped from the flashing water the silver fish she would clean and cook for their meal that day, her hands already full of the forest vegetables she had found on their walk.

Walking over to her through the shallows of the stream he raised the two wriggling animals up to her and watched with curiosity as she looked at them, and then at him. So far he had done all the killing, and for a moment the hesitation made him wonder, until she took the tails in her hand and abruptly smashed the creatures to their death with one swift snap of her wrist against the rock.

Her pale eyes blinked a few times at their sudden stillness and turned back to him.

For some reason the words pulled out of his mouth, smooth and supple like the slick scaly bodies of the fish.

"Why did you leave?"

She held the fish carefully, pulling her eyes from him and back to them, drawing a kunai as she lay them flat on the rock she had been using as a seat, slicing the belly and setting the crimson ribbons of the innards tumbling into the pristine waters of the stream, carried along and away by the current.

"Marriage." she mumbled softly, and he waited, because surely he had not heard that correctly.

"They were going to marry me off." she continued, and she accented the sentence with a snap of her knife to the fish head, setting the wide eyed shocked face into the water in one fluid motion.

Somehow he had expected something more interesting, and the grunt of disapproval seemed to make her understand that. Turning her pale eyes back to him for a moment she added. "I don't expect you to understand."

"Good." He replied, and his eyes snapped to the next fish she was going to clean, it's sudden writhing body signalling she had not hit it hard enough on the rock in the first place. Startling him she stabbed the kunai into it's head, pinning him to the rock by the gills, the splash of it's blood splashed to her neck and breathing deeply she pulled the knife down, dragging it along the belly.

He watched as the blood and water trickled down her neck, leaving long red tendrils along the marble smoothness of her skin.

* * *

Entering Orochimaru's lair he had expected she would have hesitated to continue inwards. This was his fight, his moment to destroy him but she lingered behind him, her Byakugan at the ready, her hands hovering over her kunai.

"Stay." His word had been soft, and hardly sounded like an order. Her eyes lingered on him for a moment.

"Why?"

She had not asked him a single question. Not once, and so he turned to look at her over his shoulder, dark eyes penetrating.

"Do as you please then."

And they moved forward. How long had they been this way? Months? He tried to think back, tried to remember and as they entered the shadows of his last home he marveled.

A year, at least a year if not more...

He couldn't even answer one question, despite the year. His eyes lingered on her for one moment longer before they entered the darkness.

What was this?

* * *

He had lost her in the fray.

His eyes searched through the darkness of the forest outside of the disgusting hole that Orochimaru had built himself, the snake nest had left a bad taste in his mouth but it only worsened when he realized he had no idea where she was.

The battle had been bloody, there had been screams and death and at one point he had been unsure that he was going to make it, but to his surprise he felt a strange shame that he had not thought of her, until this moment, outside in the blackness of the night.

He restrained himself, just barely, from calling her name in the darkness and telegraphing his location to everyone, instead he stopped moving, standing on the first branch of a giant oak, his stance at least thirty feet above the ground below, listening.

Suddenly from his right, he felt the whisper of cut air, the snap of sharpness to oxygen and flickered out of sight, a growl beginning at the base of his throat, watching as the kunai thrown embedded themselves to the trunk of the tree.

"Above you."

Her voice made him look sharply upwards, just in time to see the shadow of a shinobi raining down on him, kunai raised high.

"Huh." He grunted as the impact of the body slammed into him, sending them both hard against the solidity of the ancient tree branch. The eyes of the shinobi burned a bright green and he thought for a second he recognized them through the mask.

"Sasuke!"

The voice was recognizable anywhere, and with a growl of frustration he chucked the small form off of him and heard the thud of her body crumbling against the trunk of the tree.

"Sakura."

Landing beside her the blonde fox appeared, wrapping his arms around the pink haired kunoichi delicately, blue gaze blazing as he stared at Sasuke. "Teme."

"This again." Sasuke grumbled, eyes searching the darkness for his idiot teacher. "Where's the third?"

"Two trees to the left, his chakra is building. Katon." Hinata's voice whispered from the shadows and as she finished a flame exploded, hissing with anger as it ripped into the place Sasuke should have been, although instead he had taken off, running up the trunk of the tree, towards her.

Even so, he didn't miss the voices behind him and their surprise.

"Hinata!? Why are you- what are you doing?" Naruto sounded incredulous. "Where are you going?"

He saw her pale eyes before he saw anything else, and like the moon and stars that rose up as he traveled to the canopy they glowed. He didn't stop, his hand slamming out into her throat, sending her hard against the branch they stood on, pinning her there with her hands gripping his wrist so tightly it left half moons of blood from her nails in his skin.

He knew what those fingers could do, knew that they could reach out and snap his chakra closed, disable his movement, at this proximity render him blind.

But she just gasped in his grip, staring at him, waiting.

"You're one of them."

"...Sasuke."

His grip loosened, if only to hear what she had to say and sucking in the needed oxygen she relaxed against the curve of the tree branch, exposing for a moment the smoothness of her neck to him, making him angry with the craving, the fingers that had touched her there burning.

"...you were a mission..." Raising herself to her elbow she trained her pale gaze on him, and he started.

"...I did defect." She breathed in deep, her gaze level with his and despite the missing byakugan he felt she could see into him.

"...just... later..."

Unsure of whether or not he was understanding he stood, watching her pull herself to her feet slowly.

"They are here because I have stopped sending reports. They must have thought... you killed me."

He was struggling, trying to catch up. Her body behind him all these days, listening, asking no questions, watching always watching.

A mission.

He was a mission.

"You defected." HIs eyes lingered on her face, and the purse of her lips. "The marriage."

"I didn't lie." she stiffened. "They're coming, from the left, Naruto and Kakashi, from the right-"

Behind her Sakura exploded, her fists lit to fire and Hinata barely moved out of the way as the med nin's chakra exploded, sending the tree and all the occupants on it flying with the sawdust of the shattered branch outward.

He moved without thinking, grabbing Hinata around the waist, slamming into the canopy as they fell and gathering themselves they began to run. Dragging her behind him, his hand gripping hers tightly he turned to look at her.

"Tell me."

His eyes bore into hers in the shadows as they ran, and like the night of the waterfall their beauty was not lost to her, nor was the fear.

"You corrupted me." She whispered it, and her pale eyes hid nothing, glancing back sharply she stopped. "They've slowed. They're- Ah!" And she felt him slam her into the tree trunk again, pinning her there, sharingan rotating energetically.

"This was my last mission." Her gaze leveled on his face, unwavering in her stare. "My marriage to my cousin was supposed to happen two months ago."

Slowly he tilted her head up, exposing the pulsing jugular at her throat, his fingers tracing along the curve of her neck enticing a shiver through her body at his touch.

His lips finally moved onto the skin, sliding slow and methodical upwards to the hinge of her jaw, and a soft intake of breath escaped her at the feel of his teeth grazing her earlobe.

"Why you?" He was puzzled still, and he watched with interest as she sucked in another breath and felt the blood pump harder in her veins, the drum of her heart beat pulsing under his lips.

"...they did not think that I could be corrupted. Ino, Sakura... they were not chosen because..."

He nodded, and she struggled to speak again. "But I... Tsunade-sama said... I was beyond corruption by you."

His smirk against her skin made her shake, and although she was listening intently for pursuit she knew he would hear them long before she did

"Beyond corruption." He murmured, considering.

Accepting the challenge he pressed his lips to hers, parting her mouth open gently, feeling the heat of her as she sighed against him, and although he began confidently as her body moved to fit around him he shook and wondered.

Who exactly was corrupting who?

* * *

 _ **Unsure of how I feel concerning this fic. I kind of didn't like the dryness of their relationship, I think because it was largely from his point of view...**_

 _ **Maybe Hinata would have seen it differently?**_

 _ **I dunno. Just getting ideas flowing, wondering if there's another story hiding in my head.**_

 _ **leave me some love, ne?**_

 _ **Inky**_


	8. Chapter 8

_**Disruption**_

 _ **A.N**_

 _ **Not sure where this is going at all. Literally just staring at the page with the word Disruption at the top wondering if I can even do this with zero ideas.**_

 _ **Aw well, lets kick some of the ink out of my head, let the thoughts fester more comfortably.**_

 _ **Music: Keaton Henson- Romantic Works and the OST to Garden of Words because I'm feeling dark and**_

 _ **moody.**_

* * *

 _It was crimson, it was sticky, it was dark. It dripped through my fingers, it tore at the skin on my hands with it's heat and I screamed._

 _I felt the scream although I couldn't hear it. My ear drums were shot to hell and back, shreds of tissue within my head, canvas sails that no longer tensed with the breeze of sound._

 _She lay in my arms and I spewed sound, sitting with the red on my hands, looking up at the sky as the rain fell. It would wash away the blood, it would clear the tears, it would strangle the mud from the ground and we would drown together in a cocktail of fluids and earth and water._

 _I could feel the scream as it ripped through my throat, as it echoed in my head without vibrations with no song. It was a breathless shriek, a painful stab at the sky and the water that fell from the heavens cooled my warm skin._

 **This was a disruption to the tale, a page ripped out in their lives and replaced with taped together sentences in their book. An unexpected left turn.**

 **This was not how it was supposed to be.**

 **No.**

He had no intention of moving on from the vengeance dream, the focus was steadfast, the determination was solid, like an oak that hate fed. The attempts to bring him back had been in vain, and the wounds had not healed inside even if the bodies had on the outside. She watched it through the years, interested in the intensity of the blue eyes that always returned empty handed.

Why was _he_ so important?

The question plagued her and she pondered this, wondering about the darkness that hid within his chakra, the tense and slippery feel of it when she observed it, watched it slithering through his body the few times she had encountered him in the fastidious trek to find him.

His eyes had never landed on her, they were focused, determined, and smart. She was no one to worry about, her chakra subdued, her voice softer still.

But then he began to win, the fight turned ugly, and in it he was the only beautiful thing.

The sword in his hand had seemed a ribbon of water, and as he twirled it the ribbon had come away red, first from Sakura, then Naruto.

She had screamed.

 **No.**

 **This was not how it was supposed to be.**

The fight didn't last long, it was a struggle, an agony I had not realized could come from such a source. She had always been so silent, so flustered, so forgettable.

Her chakra flamed, I could feel it like an actual fire and she moved, her body lithe, her anger tangible and where it would have made others clumsy, impulsive, stupid, it sharpened her.

Infused with the DNA of her clan running through her veins I struggled, if only for a moment to comprehend what was happening, feeling as my sword was twisted from my grip, as her hands sharpened to blows of pain across my body.

Rivers that flowed were damned, electric currents shorted, my heart beat within me and stuttered with pain that I recognized. Byakugan. Gentle Fist. The Irony.

Before I could let it get out of hand my eyes glowed and the reflection of crimson on her face was swallowed by the blood already dripping down one of her cheeks, making her pale features seem mask-like in the dim light of the moon and stars.

With the help of the Uchiha blood on my side she succumbed to me, with a struggle that I admired, and when she collapsed I stared with distaste and yet pleasure.

I don't know why I didn't think to just leave her like the others. But when I lifted her in my arms it felt correct, and so I continued.

Few things in my life felt this error free. I walked, and we disappeared.

 **No.**

 **This was not how it was supposed to be.**

 **I didn't care.**

She woke to the sound of stone over the smooth expanse of a blade and she shuddered. Eyes flickering through the darkness she saw his glare glowing like a monster and her body curled tightly with anticipation.

Never having feared the dark her glare was softened only by the pearly white of her gaze.

"You should know, your life is forfeit to me." His words were barbed wire, they bit her skin, made her wince, distracting her from the feel of the pain in her bones.

"I owe you nothing." It should have come out strong but she knew it was a lie and it made the pain all the worse. He should have killed her, and yet here she was, alone with him.

"They are not dead." He sounded bored, and as he straightened she moved and felt the surprise of bandages around her torso, around her thigh, around her arm, along her jaw where his katana had sliced.

"I will leave them that way." His voice hinged on the next part and she closed her eyes, knowing what would come next. "But you must stay."

Her life or Naruto's? Sakura's?

They will come for me. She didn't say it but her eyes opened and feeble worried hope lingered there and he smiled without humor or mirth. "Perhaps they will."

It was then that she realized, her eyes were clear to him. He could read her, and there was nothing more terrifying than that.

 **This was not how it was supposed to be.**

 **She sobbed only that night, and then never again.**

It soon became apparent that I had made the correct decision. Her eyes were invaluable, and unlike Karin's twisted touches and angry demands I could smell no desire from her sweat, no yearning from her skin.

At first the relentless chase by the other members of her family meant to rescue forced me hesitate accepting her worth. Was she valuable enough for the constant running? The last confrontation broke up that question, and made it void.

I had not realized her attachment to the Kyuubi, not until that day.

"Hyuuga." My voice was lazy even to me and I wondered why nothing seemed to enter past the walls of my carelessness. The Byakugan was lined on all the faces I saw, and to avoid them all would be impossible.

Except that I had one on my side.

"Return the heiress to us." His voice was halfway order and halfway pleading. It was interesting that there was the possibility of begging in his tone and I studied the face before me with veiled curiosity. My eyes flickered from him to the bone of contention and watched as she shrunk into herself.

Her hair hid her shoulders, her hands were tightly clenched at her sides.

"I cannot return."

His eyes widened, the realization that she was with me willingly was enough to draw something out of the impassiveness that usually coated that pale face. A flicker of smugness wrangled through my insides and I shifted slightly. "You had better go back the way you came, Hyuuga."

"Hinata," His voice had raised it's pleading tones and lowered it's ordering ones. "Hinata, please."

"I have... made a bargain." Her voice broke and her eyes flickered to me. "And... I... I owe my life."

"No. Hinata." His voice was all begging now, and she flinched at the sound of her strong cousin breaking even as I reveled in it.

"That will be the extent of the discussion." My voice sliced through the stillness when I saw the tears filling her gaze. I told myself I needed those eyes clear, I needed them to see, and the tears would impose on their ability. I told myself it was irritating, I told myself she needed to stop crying.

Stop. Don't cry.

My hand landed on the katana and she flinched, reaching a hand towards me in soft supplication that Neji found revolting. He jarred back from us as though realizing he had been conversing with lepers.

"Hinata." and that was no longer begging but mourning in his voice. The coil of tension inside me depressed further. He would either risk her by fighting or retreat for now.

We watched them fade, like ghosts from a far off mist back into the darkness of the trees and she studied the shadows longer than I did, seeing past the black void of the trees to the flickering torches of energy that made up her family.

"When will you finally kill me?" She whispered it as we stared into the maze of woodland.

I let my head lean slightly to the right, a half inch of contemplation.

"Maybe never."

It should have been reassuring but I knew from the way she finally closed her eyes and breathed in slowly, deeply, forcefully, that it had not been the answer she was hoping for.

 **It was not supposed to be this way.**

 **And I was starting to care.**

Her breathing was ragged. She could hardly stand and the weakness in her legs reminded her of a time long ago when her family had thought her useless, when they would not have sent a search team to retrieve her.

And now that she was something, now that she could hold her head high among her Hyuuga peers here she was, as good as dead, but more horribly, owned.

He was ruthless.

A flip of his wrist and the kunai seemed to fly with his mind in control of their trajectory. Her twisting body barely escaped the initial attack unscathed and with hardly a heartbeat to break up the flow of movement she was up and parrying a blow from the katana with a short sword he had provided. The grunt of frustration that escaped her was also a grunt of pain. His sword slid hard against her blade, sending sparks like fireflies through her hair and she felt his breath against her cheek.

"It's like you don't want to kill me."

His taunt made a growl escape her throat, a sound she doubted she had ever made before but the feel of words leaving oxygen from his mouth on her lips was disconcerting and frightening and before she knew what she was doing she had twisted, the blades snapping to the right of her shoulder, her elbow sharp against his sternum, his voice a strangled grunt of pain.

The training was paying off in ways she had not realized as her elbow shot up and then down, landing with force on the back of his neck and sending him crumbling to the forest floor.

He had not been fighting to win and she knew it, as he lay there still beneath her shadow. If he had, his sharingan would have seen her attack coming, would have been able to deflect it. He was faster, he was stronger, he was Uchiha.

For a moment the woodland beckoned. Recon was her specialty and she would be able to get into the shadows to never see him again. He would be avoided easily, his chakra would be a flame in a black empty room and with her eyes she could keep him away, until she reached help, until they came to rescue her.

Her hand opened and closed beside her, studying the prostrate man with care, his breathing slow and uneven in his forced uncomfortable slumber.

Could she leave now? She had been unable to protect Naruto, or Sakura at the last battle, she had succumbed to him, and had he not for whatever reason found her eyes useful he would have killed them all.

Her breath left soft fog up in front of her face as she panted and slowly lowered herself to crouch above him, touching his hair for only a moment as she studied his face.

"We made a bargain." she whispered, knowing that to protect the preciousness of the blonde, she could not break it.

She was Hyuuga.

Her word, it was all she had left to prove that fact.

 **It was not supposed to be this way.**

 **But she stayed.**

That winter was harder than all the others I had spent alone. With my back to the mountain and my face looking outward to the valley below I strained not to shudder despite the heaviness of the cloak around me and the thick wool of the clothes below it. She stood, as always two steps back, to the right. A constant ever present shadow.

"Anything?"

Her chakra shifted behind me and her gaze I knew would expand. She could see me, the subtle hues of my energy pumping through my body and I wondered if over time it made sense to her in a way it still didn't to me.

"I can detect no chakra for several miles." Her voice was gentle, it was quiet largely from lack of use. Besides soft cursory nods she rarely spoke. I suppose you have to have questions asked to answer them.

"Any lakes?"

She seemed surprised, if only a little. Just the barest twitch of her brows before she turned to look back out. "Two, one smaller than the other. The small one will be frozen solid to the bottom though, in this weather."

Around us the snow began to fall, and I looked up, feeling the flakes on my cheeks as they drifted, whispering through the quiet like feathers on a breeze.

"The other?"

"Bigger, I am unsure about the depth." She was looking at me, I could feel the penetration of her gaze like the subtle curve of a knife along my skin.

"This is going to be a lot of snow." I watched as the dark clouds rolled above, peering through lashes bent on protecting my precious eyes from the falling frozen water. "We need to set up camp."

"Okay." Her voiced response surprised me, made me turn to look at her and meet her gaze for the first time in months. She stared back, as if puzzled, as much as I was.

Wandering down the mountain side to the valley was a long trek but shinobi make long things seem short by the movement of their limbs. Reaching the water's edge I frowned at the frozen smoothness of the plain. Beyond the shallows was the subtle movement of waves.

"It looks frozen almost to the center." She whispered. "But it's hard to tell."

Carefully I stepped out onto the ice, and felt her shift behind me, moving to follow.

"Wait."

"Okay." Her acquiesce made me look back at her again, that puzzled expression mirrored on her face as much as mine.

The ice shifted beneath me, rolling like a board on waves and I realized how thin it was. It would have to do. "Set up a fire." I murmured, and felt her shift behind me again, as if to come onto the ice.

"But..."

My eyes raised to her once more, and I watched her cheeks flame to apples on her face. "Of course." She corrected and moved back into the depths of the wood, the sound of her gathering branches echoing into my ears from the stillness.

Nothing moved in this world. With the snow falling and the wind dead it was as though we were in a place made of foam. No hard edges made contact to create sound, and her soft movements were loud as a result.

Not as loud perhaps as what I was going to do, but loud.

Lifting a hand up, I aimed carefully into the frozen ice, eyes focused, feeling the chakra pumping into my fist and with a soft "Hn," let the impact of my fist fester into the lake. The bite of the water was sharp, as sharp as the impact of my hand against the solidity of the ice. But the pain of the winter lake was worse and I had to focus not to flinch as I withdrew my limb from the new hole in the glass surface I stood on.

Finding fish in this would be difficult. But it had been several weeks since our last solid meal and although she moved easily I could see the bones of her cheeks more clearly, the shape of her shoulder blades piercing through her clothing.

Dead she was useless.

Setting the trap was easy and familiar, I scanned my surroundings as I did so, studying the world coated in white, watching the cotton puffs of ice drifting lazy through the lack of wind.

I felt her before I saw or heard her. The abilities of the Hyuuga for recon were legendary I knew this, but feeling her chakra before hearing her in this vast silence surprised me. I cocked my head only a little to the right, pulling the makeshift trap up from the depths of the water with two small fish inside it already.

"I don't feel chakra but..." her voice hung in the air as she looked around, pensive. "I feel something."

My eyes finally looked over my shoulder at her, curious of her tone, watching her Byakugan levelling the area with it's power, seeing the minute details I could never be privy to.

"...anything?"

One small shake of her head and then the ice snapped.

It didn't crack so much as explode, the glass shards of the frozen water moving upwards with the momentum of an enormous fish, it's gills wide and gasping as it ripped through the freezing ice below my feet, mouth opening and closing with predatory intent and the razor sharp teeth snapping at the air to prove it.

The moment of shock was brief, it was replaced instead by disbelief as I felt her body hit mine with force and before I knew it she, and the fish were sliding under the dark water of the lake.

I choked on the shout that was her name, snapping my arms into the water and feeling it's agonizing bite just as she broke the surface with a gasp that was half scream.

Gripping her hard I pulled and the weight of her, and all her clothes soaked threatened for a moment to drag us both in.

But I wasn't a shinobi for nothing, and growling deep in my throat I pulled, collapsing with her for a moment on the ice, feeling her shudders wracking through my body and destroying hers.

She was already blue, her lips disappearing into a faded purple sheen that matched the lavender of her soft eyes.

"What were you thinking?" I snapped, heaving her into my arms and running across the smooth expanse of the ice.

Her head lolled on her neck like it was too well oiled a joint to keep steady.

"I wasn't." She chattered and her eyes threatened to close.

"Stay awake." My voice sounded gruff, like I had something stuck in the back of my throat. "Stay awake right now."

"Yes."

In the shadows I saw the fire, and knew that she was going to need more than that. Gritting my teeth I began to remove her clothes.

 **It was not supposed to be this way.**

 **But it was.**

Waking to the feel of life beside her, she stilled. The ribs of her right side were pressed to another person's skin and knowing where she was and who she was she felt herself shoot through with pain. There was only one person who she could be so intimately pressed to. Only one other human in the expanse of wilderness around them.

Despite her lamentations, he was warm. The heat drifted from his body to hers and her feet and hands felt like they might fall off without it. Like committing a sin she grit her teeth and closed her eyes tightly feeling herself greedily curling against him, finding warm places to tuck her hands, between them, between his arm and his torso, along the smoothness of his sternum.

She could feel the tickle of his black hair on her forehead, the feel of his breath on her brow but she kept her eyes down, shuddering. There was no blush today. Today there was only a blue tinge and painful skin.

"That was foolish." His voice couldn't stop her from shuddering even more, and closing her eyes she wondered if it would be possible to pretend she was still asleep. But he was too clever and she wasn't stupid enough.

"I'm sorry."

He had made some sort of caccoon from their clothes and gear. They didn't carry much, just what they wore and some basic supplies. She could feel she was in something of his, a shirt that was too big and smelled of him, of pine and forest leaves and man. She had been so cold the last few days she had had all of her clothes on, nothing extra to be spared from the freezing lake.

The fire was behind him and so she couldn't see his face, but she was sure he could see hers, and being intimately tangled as they were she was sure it would have been better to die in the water.

Eaten by a fish. A worthy exit compared to this.

"Your clothing will be dry soon." His words seemed so non chalant, as though they had been conversing easily all along but that was far from the truth. Months they could go saying a handful of sentences to each other. Even in battle they were reduced to yes no and questions about location.

Yet here she was, nearly naked and essentially in bed with him. A sound escaped her that may have been a sob if she had allowed it to live and be born, but she strangled it, pressing a hand to her mouth, feeling her warm breath on her numb cold fingers.

He surprised her, his wrip on her wrist moving her palm from her mouth. "I did not touch you." His tone carried weight, she tried to decipher it's candence, memorizing it's tone. Was he angry? Bothered? Insulted?

It didn't matter either way, there was nothing to her. She belonged to no one and nothing. The only way that she would ever be anything but what she was now would be if he died. The cost of her having a different life would be his death.

So then why didn't she let the fish have him?

"...I did not think that." she found herself saying, trying to soothe whatever hurt she had inflicted with her pain.

He was quiet then, and she felt herself shift, despite the voice inside her that had sent up the half sob of distress. She tucked her face along his body, between his neck and shoulder, pressing her cold nose to his skin in the hopes of thawing it.

She drifted back into the darkness then, as the warmth engulfed her, trying not to mourn again so loud that he would hear and be hurt by it.

 **It should not have been this way.**

 **But for whatever reason she cared.**

We wandered through the wastelands of our world, through freezing tundras and scorching sand storms, her shadow always behind me, two steps, three, her voice always in reply to mine, whispering.

Her hands became sharper, quicker, her strength a testament that she had never been inadequate, just badly taught.

The eyes that I had grown to value so much scanned the horizons, inspecting the landscape, painting a view that had nothing to do with the colors and shapes of the immense world around us, but the pinpricks of light that flickered for her in a shadowy place I never saw.

The northern passage was not as cold as the winter had been, but the dryness of the air and the plummeting temperature at night made her hands shake despite the blazing fire I had had to feed with Katon to keep bright.

Out in the wildness of the darkness that surrounded us the howls of the wolves shouted back at the crackle of our flames.

"When you see him..." her voice whispered softly and I turned to look at her, hearing the notes in the word "him" that explained to me exactly who she meant. "...will I be allowed to help you bring him down?"

I stared.

She was looking into the flames and her shoulders were shaking, a frantic seizure of her limbs before they stopped and she hunched deeper into her cloak, burying her face into the high neck. It was one of mine, as hers had been ruined by the disaster of the lake, freezing nearly solid and then scorching in the heat of the fire but never fully drying. Thankfully I had the extra and in it she shrank in size, her pale eyes peering over the top of the dark fabric, cat like.

"No." I answered after too long a beat and she seemed unsurprised by the reply, if a little defensive.

I waited, knowing another word would come from her mouth, and I would not like it. I tensed my shoulders and set my eyes on the flames, feeling her gaze lift and wander over me, light as a feather in the freezing dry cold.

"But..."

"I said no."

Surprised by my interuption she blinked slowly, as though my three words had cut her and she turned back to the fire.

"If I should fall, leave." I muttered. Of course she would, I was not sure why I even said that. It slipped off my tongue like some sort of involuntary sneeze and to keep myself from feeling sick I poked the fire with one of the sticks we had gathered from the expanse of tundra and bush. Her eyes lingered on me again, watching me move unnessesarily and I knew I was transmitting something to her through my actions. I did not know what, and it was infuriating me.

"You won't fall."

My gaze snapped to hers, but she had turned away, and for a moment I wondered if what I heard had been in my mind.

I did not speak again.

 **It was not supposed to be this way.**

 **She was not supposed to die.**

When I heard his scream I could not stay hidden. He was in his mind, Itachi's hands on his neck, pinning him to the wall, staring into him and Sasuke's mouth opened and a sound came out of it that, if I lived through this, would haunt me.

I doubted it would get the chance. Honestly, I almost hoped not.

I should have stayed hidden. Itachi had no use for me, this fight was not about me, had nothing to do with me, would never involve me.

At least... once upon a time that would have been true but the sound was in my ears and I couldn't help it. I moved.

Like in every battle we faced together, with his back to mine and our eyes focused outwards, I caught the shuriken that flew to him, I shoved him to avoid a killing blow, the bite of jutsu, the hiss of traps.

Like with the fish in the lake and the razor sharp teeth that threatened to have him, I moved. I didn't think, I just did.

I was faster, stronger and my chakra control better than I had ever been since being caught so long ago by his rotating sharingan gaze. I was a devil with white eyes, a flash of lightening wielded by his chidori infused hand. I didn't have much time, it was going to be an all or nothing move for me, because the moment I appeared I knew his brother would use me.

I could not be used by two Uchihas. My soul decided it would be better to die.

And so I raced. I raced to my death, to his freedom and victory. I launched myself at their fight, and hoped that my actions would not take from him his glory.

I hoped he would have peace.

 **It was not supposed to be this way**

 **But I helped, and that was enough.**

 _It was crimson, it was sticky, it was dark. It dripped through my fingers, it tore at the skin on my hands with it's heat and I screamed._

 _I felt the scream although I couldn't hear it. My ear drums were shot to hell and back, shreds of tissue within my head, canvas sails that no longer tensed with the breeze of sound._

 _She lay in my arms and I spewed sound, sitting with the red on my hands, looking up at the sky as the rain fell. It would wash away the blood, it would clear the tears, it would strangle the mud from the ground and we would drown together in a cocktail of fluids and earth and water._

 _I could feel the scream as it ripped through my throat, as it echoed in my head without vibrations with no song. It was a breathless shriek, a painful stab at the sky and the water that fell from the heavens cooled my warm skin._

 _My brother lay dead beside me, she lay dead in my arms and in the void of deafness I succumbed._

 _In the end she defeated me, before he could ever rip my heart out of my chest to slay me, she had already won it, and disappeared..._

 **No.**

 **This was a disruption to their tale.**

 **This was not how it was supposed to be. A** **page ripped out in their lives and replaced with taped together sentences in their book. An unexpected left turn.**

 **But it was.**

* * *

 _ **...fuck, sorry lol. Not exactly valentine's day reading, eh? Yikes.**_

 ** _it's okay if you don't leave me some love on this one, I get it._**

 ** _-Inky_**


	9. Chapter 9

_**Envy**_

* * *

When she walked into the library the whole tone of the building changed. It wasn't the kind of thing most people would notice but Uchiha's were a special breed. With the kind of behemoth company they were aimed to rule in the quickly coming future their training included everything, from polite conversation to business classes and finally to round out an already extensive schedule, awareness and self defense training.

So it took them both about a second to sense the change in atmosphere and two seconds to locate it's source.

She had had her head down, and her hair was falling around her in a curtain of black that extended well past her shoulders, elbows and hips, swaying with the breeze of her quick steps despite the book that she held a little ways from her face.

Sasuke's eyes were the first to find her, and when they locked on the atmosphere changing specimen he blinked rapidly, eyeing the rest of the people sitting around them on the campus library. Careful to keep his face calm and collected he followed her with his eyes, ignoring the thumping in his chest.

"Who's that?" Itachi asked very quietly. At the long tables lined with green shaded lamps young men and women whispered to each other at her entrance, glancing right and left at each other, their lips moving but their words muffled aside from the rapid hiss of air leaving them between their teeth.

"...It's the Hyuuga Princess." Sasuke commented lightly, turning back to his book as though he didn't care. Her approach towards the service counter had everyone in a tizzy. Students attempted to not be obvious about their staring but the amount of glancing that was happening would be hard to miss if you were blind.

"Princess?" Itachi asked again, blinking at his younger brother. Konoha U was not where he usually studied. He had majored in Biochemistry and Business at Akatsuki U and so the gossip circle of the school was beyond him. Which made it a safer place to study. Avoiding flirting girls and issues with classmates competing with him over grades was always easier here.

"Yes." Sasuke flipped the page in his book and continued reading. "Her family are the rulers of some tiny country on the border. Byakugan, I think it's called."

"An _actual_ princess?" Itachi turned his gaze back to the girl and watched the elegant movement of her wrist as she lowered her book to the service desk counter, the way she tilted her head while asking a question. Her attire seemed normal enough. A white flowing skirt to her ankles, pretty low key black shoes, a blue top that rippled as she moved and a small belt around her tiny waist.

It wasn't until he glanced behind her that he noticed the two men standing a few feet away from her looking stern and business like.

"You weren't kidding." He mused, leaning back in his chair. "Who are they?"

His younger brother sighed, glancing up again to study who he was gesturing to subtly with his chin. "Neji, and Lee. They're her bodyguards." He rolled his eyes and turned back to his school work. "She's been attending here for nearly three years, you would think that people would get used to her wandering around."

"I'm surprised." Itachi admitted. "I had not heard of her."

"They keep it pretty low key, I think." Sasuke muttered.

"You seem to know a lot about it." Itachi's slow smile made Sasuke lift his eyes sternly up to him. "You wouldn't be thinking of catching yourself a princess would you? I guess you're technically the prince of Uchiha Corp, but..."

The painfully slow blink in response to his statement made Itachi's smile widen. "Well good." He pushed out of his chair. "Just checking." And he started towards the service counter.

Sasuke straightened, eyes widening in growing alarm as he approached the girl, giving Neji a wave that the pale man winced at before leaning against the smooth marble where Hinata's book lay open, his hands moving gently as he said something.

Whispers hissed like snakes all around and Sasuke let his lips part if only a few centimeters in his shock.

 _That cocky bastard..._

The gray eyed princess smiled at something he said, nodding her head slowly and elegantly on her long neck, fingers fluttering like butterfly wings into her hair, tucking a long black strand of silk behind her ear, cheeks reddening as Itachi continued to speak.

Suddenly however Itachi was leaning back, turning to point towards Sasuke, and just like that every head in the library was turning towards him, including and most importantly the brunette who's cheeks had yet to pale again.

Shooting a handful of glares to disperse the unwelcome attention from nearby peers he turned back to his book, watching out of the corner of his eye as Itachi encouraged the girl to follow him back to the table.

 _Oh no... Itachi... argh. No no no._

Jaw clenching and unclenching just the slightest bit Sasuke scribbled something in his notebook, unsure of what it was, just as Itachi's shadow loomed over his textbook.

"This is my little brother, Sasuke." Itachi was saying, waving at the brooding young man at the table. Pulling from every lesson in etiquette he had ever bothered to pay attention to Sasuke turned his eyes up to the girl approaching and felt as his chest caved in on itself.

He had seen her from afar often, her inaccessibility and constant attention making her completely untouchable in his mind. She had been an oddity glanced out of the periphery of his life for years. Save for snatched moments here and there...

But standing right there in front of him he was feeling more and more nervous. Perfect pink lips smiled slowly at him, matching the delicate hue of pink on her cheeks that he had seen his friend Sakura attempt to duplicate with make up more than once in his life. Hair as smooth as water and dark like the ink in his calligraphy pens moved smoothly as she nodded once and extended one small long fingered hand out to him.

"P-pleasure to meet you... Sasuke." She blinked bright gray eyes at him, the long lashes making them seem bigger as she studied him. "I... I believe we have had several classes together through the years."

His hand dwarfed hers in comparison as he shook it, surprised by the firm calm grip she returned.

"I think so." He managed to supply, eyes flickering to Itachi who was ushering her to the chair next to his own.

"Miss Hyuuga-"

"Oh... no, please. I'm just Hinata." The girl murmured gently, accepting the chair that Itachi pulled out for her.

"Oh great." Itachi sounded pleasantly surprised. "I thought I might have been rude. Do people not call you Princess?"

"Oh... no, not... I mean, sometimes." She blinked rapidly as she settled and as her hair danced over her shoulders a smell of something sweet and lovely like the peach trees in Sasuke's mother's orchard right after a summer rain flooded the table.

"It's usually Your Royal Highness." She mumbled. "But please, please don't call me that."

Itachi's smile could have melted the ice caps as he gazed at her. "Wouldn't dream of it."

Hinata was busily pulling out books from her bag, glancing around at the onlookers at the other tables as she did so. "I'm very sorry." She added softly, her eyes lifting and meeting Sasuke's briefly before blushing and turning back down to her pencils and pens. "I... tend to attract unwanted attention."

Sasuke's gaze leveled at the young man approaching from behind, back stiff and thick black brows pulled into a serious half frown stating there was some dignified thoughts happening inside his very black head. "Your Royal Highness." He murmured softly into Hinata's ear. "Master Neji is wondering if it is your desire to spend some time in the library to study instead of returning home." Lee murmured. "He had understood that the plan was to gather materials for studying in the dormitory."

"Ah... yes..." Hinata turned to look at her bodyguard. "Thank you, Lee. I... I do wish to stay if only briefly."

"Oh surely not briefly." Itachi's hand on her elbow drew Sasuke's gaze sharply, and blood to Hinata's finally cooling face again.

"Oh." She blinked rapidly at him for a moment, every turn of her head releasing that summer rain scent into the air. "I..."

"Perhaps we could treat you to lunch after." Itachi's gaze turned to Sasuke, who stared back at him placidly.

"Um..." Hinata began, eyes flickering to Sasuke again.

"What should I tell Master Neji, Your Royal Highness?" Lee asked softly again. In the distance keeping an eye on the door the aforementioned Neji was eyeing the doorways, eyes trained away from the conversation happening at the library table.

"Please... please tell him that you can both take the next couple of hours off." Hinata smiled a little at Lee. "I will return to my rooms shortly after 2."

Without another word Lee retreated and walked purposefully back towards his boss.

"Excellent." Itachi looked satisfied, and also uninterested in the work he had been doing before she arrived, one elbow rested on the surface of his textbook as he watched Hinata pulling out items from her bag and settling them on the work surface.

"Wow, business technology?" he tapped the text with one long finger. "I'm surprised. Doesn't royalty need to study political science?"

Her eyes strayed again to Sasuke for a second before turning back to him and Itachi curiously glanced at his brother again who was studiously staring at his textbook.

"Yes... I do... this is my minor." She murmured softly, and then jumped when Itachi took her hand in his, studying the ring that she had on her thumb.

"That's a very pretty ring." He began, turning it in the light. Hinata's face flamed, and her eyes once more flashed to Sasuke who had sighed deeply.

"Um..." she began.

"I think I may have seen this before. Didn't you get one kind of like this once, Sasuke?" Itachi continued, and then looked up at her, leaning forward. "Maybe I'm just confused though, you're pretty enough to dazzle the senses."

Heat was rushing to Hinata's face so fast her ears were no longer pink but red and her perfect little mouth opened to stutter something else out, voice caught like a bird in a cage when she felt Itachi's thumb on her bottom lip.

"I mean. I've seen pretty but you're..." he began leaning forward again provocatively, eyes flickering to her mouth.

"Ugh." Sasuke stood, walking with purposefully steps around the table. As he reached his brother's side he lifted the book in his hand and brought it down with a thunk on his head that echoed in the still library where everyone was watching with bated breath.

Hinata's little 'eep' of surprise was the only sound and then a deep dark chuckle as Itachi leaned away from her and peered at Sasuke through a wince.

Taking the Princess's hand Sasuke pulled her to her feet. "Come on." He muttered irritably, to which she answered in some unintelligible way, following behind him quickly.

"You should have just told me you were dating the heir to the Byakugan Empire, Sasuke!" Itachi shouted after him as he dragged the girl along by the hand. "I had to find out from a reporter! I mean, really! And I was kind of envious you didn't give me a fair go at her too, she's gorgeous!"

Hinata flushed red again at his words while she stumbled after Sasuke. "Sorry! I'm sorry, I was trying so hard to not say anything!" She gasped behind him, flustered.

Sasuke stopped, turned around and stared at her for a minute with everyone else watching and whispering in amusement as Itachi chuckled to himself.

"You don't have to be sorry."

"But, I... I- I know you wanted to keep it private. I've been so careful for so many years-" Hinata began.

"You know what, screw private." Sasuke grumbled, taking her cheeks in his hands and pulling her towards him, lips pressing to her delicious mouth so hard he leaned her back, dipping her lightly in the foyer of the University Library to the surprised whoops and gasps and applause of their classmates.

Itachi watched, a rueful smile on his face.

"Lucky twerp." He muttered, rolling his eyes before gathering their things to head out for lunch so he could officially meet his brother's girlfriend of three years. Finally.

* * *

 ** _Super short quick thing I had floating around in my head clogging the pipes._**

 ** _:)_**

 ** _-inky_**


End file.
